Parents struggle to prevent St. Catherine School closure amid low enrollment

Parents are making a last-ditch effort to register new students for a longtime Catholic private school set to close at the end of the school year due to low enrollment.

The St. Catherine School in Kapa‘a has been in operation since 1946, serving students from kindergarten through eighth grade. 

As a private school, administrators rely on the roughly $8,000 per year in student tuition to keep the school in operation.

But with a school capacity of 200 students and only 47 currently attending, its administration has decided to close at the end of the year, citing financial constraints caused by its low enrollment.

Reverend Nicholas Apetorgbor, who heads the school, first announced the closure in a parish bulletin dated Feb. 8, 2024. 

“After prayerful reflection, careful consideration, exploring various options, and numerous conversations with stakeholders, we regret to inform you that St. Catherine School will be closing its doors at the end of the current school year,” he said. 

“Due to low enrollment, we find ourselves unable to sustain the current operational model of the school.” 

To keep the school open, administrators had proposed a micro-school model, a less expensive option for the school that would see multiple grade levels mixed together in one classroom.

That model would still require a minimum number of 55 students in order to implement, according to Apertorgbor. “But unfortunately, fewer parents than expected showed interest in the micro-school model.”

St. Catherine’s administrators have given the parents a deadline of today, March 15, at 2:15 p.m. to get 55 students signed up with an intent to enroll and a $300 deposit to reconsider moving forward with a micro-school program.

According to Apertorgbor, 28 parents have submitted intents to enroll their keiki for the 2024-25 school year.

Following news of the closure, some parents have rallied together to try to find the minimum number of students needed to prevent the school from closure.

On Wednesday afternoon, a small group of parents and their children held up signs advertising for micro-school enrollment on a sidewalk off of Kūhiō Highway in Kapaa‘a town. 

Prisma Brewer, who attended St. Catherine’s herself from second through eighth grade, spoke about plans to enroll her 4-year-old child in the fall after having had a positive experience as a student.

“It was a great experience. The class sizes at the school were super small,” Brewer said. “Just being able to be in a Catholic environment and having that foundation was super important to me.”

Polina Povracka, who also has a 4-year-old son whom she planned to enroll for the upcoming 2024-25 school year, is interested in the micro-school’s less conventional approach to education. 

“They would still have that little more old-fashioned type of values, but also, as far as educational style, it would be more non-conventional and a little more progressive,” Povracka said.