St. Teresa’s Catholic School set to close at the end of the year

ALBANY, Ga. – An Albany private school made a difficult announcement regarding their future this week.

After decades of molding young minds, St. Teresa’s Catholic School will close down at the end of the current school year. And, we got a chance to speak with the principal about the difficult decision.

The decision came late last week that, after more than 70 years, the school will cease operations…

Interim principal, Maggie Dexter says the school has seen a decline in enrollment over the last few years.

“…And, so it was toward the end of last year, our Principal and Assistant Principal at that time have resigned. We were just coming out of that covid pandemic. I came in during the midst of the pandemic so you could see that the school had struggled,” said Maggie Dexter, Interim Principal, St. Teresa’s Catholic School.

Dexter goes on to say that the Parrish had to make the difficult decision amid overall numbers declining.

As an educator, it hurts her knowing a legacy of helping kids grow is coming to an end.

“It’s heartbreaking. We’ve had a really good parental leadership here in the way of a PTO. We re-established a parent-teacher organization here at the beginning of this school year. I just don’t think we were able to do that in enough time to save the school,” said Dexter.

Maggie says the ones who stand to be hurt the most by this closing are the students.

But they need to make sure for the time the school has left to keep students and their families engaged.

“…And, that’s why right now, I feel like my job right now, between now and the end of the school year, is to keep our students encouraged, to keep our faculty encouraged, to keep our families encouraged, and to be able to help our families. Because now all of us are in a position that we have new decisions to make…” said Dexter.

While St. Teresa’s Catholic School is going to close down, Dexter says they’ve gotten support from the local community of private schools in the wake of this announcement.

The current school year for St. Teresa’s is set to finish at the end of May.

Brian Roche reporting.

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