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Diocese of
Savannah
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Vol. 81, No. 17
Thursday, April 26, 2001
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NCEA convention draws more than 12,000 educators to Milwaukee
The delegation from the Diocese of Savannah
enjoys the convention.
M ore than 12,000 Catholic educa
tors spent their Easter vacation
in Milwaukee learning how they
could do their jobs better.
Teachers and school principals from
across the country who attended the
annual National Catholic Educational
Association’s annual convention April
17-20 picked up everything from new
teaching exercises to broad concepts
of Catholic education and innovative
ways to raise money.
The four days of workshops and
general sessions began with a keynote
address by Milwaukee Archbishop
Rembert G. Weakland, who urged the
educators to think globally and to
form students as leaders who would
see beyond their own culture. He war
ned that too often “people outside the
United States see globalization as
Americanization.”
To counter this perception, he said,
Catholic school students must leam
“to critique profoundly where we
live,” and understand that the United
States might not have all the answers.
He urged educators to continue to
form the moral, intellectual, spiritual
and social dimensions of their stu
dents, as a way to stand apart from the
ever-growing secularism in society.
“Secularism is proposed as a solu
tion,” Archbishop Weakland said, and
many believe religion should be kept
quiet because of the perceived divi
siveness it creates, but “we have to
leam how the values of every religion
contribute” to the good of all.
“The world needs us,” he said of
the Catholic perspective on the many
necessary aspects of education. He
praised Catholic schools for their
emphasis on virtues like discipline,
respect and loyalty, which he said
make their students more than just
“brain people.”
The archbishop also briefly touched
on the issue of school choice, which
was the focus of a daylong sympo
sium at the convention.
“If I have been an advocate of
school vouchers, it is because they
give poor parents a more level play
ing field in selecting a good education
for their children,” he said. “More
over, we Catholics have a good track
record in being able to help the poor.”
The April 19 keynote speaker, Ho
ward Fuller, likewise praised school-
choice initiatives, describing them as
“a critical weapon in the arsenal that
is needed to achieve effective educa
tion for all our children, particularly
for our poorest children of color.”
Fuller, who is founder and director
of the Institute for the Transformation
of Learning at Milwaukee’s Marquet
te University, was superintendent of
Milwaukee Public Schools from 1991
to 1995.
In 1990, Wisconsin was the first
state to offer a publicly-funded,
school-choice program for children of
low-income urban families. And since
1998, eligible families have been able
to use state-funded vouchers to send
their children to religious schools.
About 40 percent of Milwaukee’s
9,638 choice students attend Catholic
schools in the city. Fuller said
Catholics are often needlessly defen
sive or apologetic about including
their schools in a choice program.
But, as he sees it, “Why apologize for
wanting to save something that serves
people well?”
The convention’s closing speaker,
Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister, stir
red controversy among a few church
officials even before her appearance in
Milwaukee. When the NCEA an
nounced its choice of the well-known
spiritual writer and lecturer as a key
noter, church officials in the dioceses
of Peoria, Illinois, and Pittsburgh cited
objections to her writings critical of
church teaching on the ordination of
women, homosexuality and other
issues, and announced they would not
allocate diocesan funds to pay for their
teachers to attend the convention.
Sister Chittister acknowledged
some rare nervousness April 20 in
front of the crowd of educators, but
told them she was “really happy” to
be there and “even happier that you’re
here.” She urged the teachers and
school administrators to become con
summate questioners and to recognize
that the “courage to question the
seemingly unquestionable is the
essence of spiritual leadership.”
Sister Chittister, who holds the
Bruggeman chair of ecumenical theol
ogy at Jesuit-run Xavier University in
Cincinnati, encouraged the educators
to pass on this notion of questioning
to their students. “Teach them to
question,” she said. “Teach them to
think.” She also told the educators to
teach their students not to despair
when looking at the future of wo
men’s roles in the church. “The disci
ples who were with Jesus didn’t want
him talking to women either,” she
said. “Like Jesus, teach them to
silence the silencing.”
In the hundreds of workshops dur
ing the convention, teachers also were
encouraged to think about new ways
to present poetry and math problems,
as well as ways to help today’s youth
navigate through issues of sexuality,
self-esteem and peer pressure.
During one workshop, Maureen
Blum, principal of Our Lady of the
Lake Elementary School in Seattle,
said her school participated in a bully
ing prevention pilot program after one
student had yelled out that he “wanted
to kill everyone in his class.” In the
aftermath of recent school shootings,
Blum said, “our eyes have to be open
to students who don’t think they
belong.” The school came up with a
definition of bullying and followed a
curriculum that included videos such
as “How To Enter a Peer Group,”
“How To Make a Friend,” and “What
To Do When Someone Is Bullying
You.” At the end of the lessons, stu
dents signed an anti-bullying pledge.
Blum told her Catholic school col
leagues that she was convinced the
message was getting through when
she recently overheard a student on
the playground tell another student:
“That is bullying. If you do not stop, I
am getting an adult.”
At an April 18 workshop on “To
Play as Jesus Did: Athletics and the
Gospel Mission of the Catholic
School,” Augustinian Father Richard
J. McGrath told his audience why he
is convinced that Catholic schools
benefit in many ways by having suc
cessful athletic programs. The priest,
who is the author of a book about
athletic programs in Catholic
schools, said those benefits include
positive name recognition in the
community, more opportunities for
students and parents to participate in
Catholic education, and development
of student-athletes’ talents. Eight
educators attended the NCEA con
vention from the Diocese of
Savannah: Sisters Rose Mary Col
lins, SSJ, superintendent of schools,
Joan Felicia O’Reilly, IHM, and Ber
nadette Taraschi, and Clare O’Reilly,
Cindy Andrews, Betty Gatsch, Linda
Johnson and Grace Ledwitch.
A priestly triumvirate
—page 3
Christmas in April
—pages 7
Evangelization and
faith