Community gets up-close look at Catholic school in Wadsworth
By Beth Kramer ekramer@stmedianetwork.com January 29, 2012 6:08PM
Peyton Carney, 5, of Wadsworth, and mom Janelle Carney, check out books during open house Sunday at St. Patrick's School in Wadsworth. | Joe Shuman~for Sun-Times Media
Catholic Schools Week 2012
The annual, national observance begins the last Sunday in January and runs for a week. The 2012 theme is “Catholic Schools: Faith. Academics. Service.” Catholic Schools Week began in 1972.
Source: National Catholic Educational Association
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Updated: March 30, 2012 1:30AM
The Priebe family had a lot of adjusting to do when it relocated to Wadsworth from Georgia six years ago.
The family of Catholics was used to life in the deep south, and Rachel Priebe said she’d only seen snow once before they moved to Lake County.
A major component that eased the transition for their two children was continuing their education in a private school, Priebe said.
“It was important for us (my husband and I) to continue their faith. Although the location was so different, the uniforms are the same and the beliefs are the same,” Priebe said.
She sent her children, now in Grades 4 and 8, St. Patrick Catholic School in Wadsworth.
Priebe, now a school-board member and PTO president at St. Pat’s, was on hand Sunday to share her experiences at the school’s open-house event.
Sunday was the first time the school coordinated an open house on the Sunday of Catholic Schools Week, according to St. Patrick School Principal Marcie Bosnak of Waukegan.
“Catholic Schools Week is to showcase the school to the parish and the community at large. What we want to do is get our parish (members) into the school,” St. Patrick School Principal Marcie Bosnak said.
The school has 646 students in preschool through eighth grade. There is a maximum of 35 students allowed per class. Each grade has two classes.
About 95 percent of the school’s students come from the parish, she estimated. Tuition starts at $2,600 for a parish student with a graduated system for siblings.
The private school is in the Gurnee School District 56 public system. “We do draw mostly from the Gurnee area. I think for a lot of families, it’s a question of priorities. For some of our families, there is no trip to Disneyland but there is Catholic School,” Bosnak said.
One parent described tuition as “not a cost, but an investment,” she said.
“What I want for kids when they graduate is to be ready for the next level and know who Jesus is,” Bosnak said.
Second-grade teacher Kim Underwood of Lindenhurst said she likes being able to incorporate Catholic beliefs into academic subject areas.
“I think that the biggest difference (from a public school) is that we’re able to talk about Jesus in an open way and keep (Jesus) in lots of different areas,” Underwood said.
Seventh-grade student Erin Kehoe, 12, of Gurnee, has attended St. Patrick since preschool.
“I love this school because I think it’s great we can talk about God any way we want to,” Kehoe said.
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