Page 17: Integrating Faith and Academics continued...

The CHSHR, appreciating the diverse clienteles of Catholic high schools across the United States, attempts to take into account the socio-economic status of a school’s students. Having assessed tuition levels, tuition assistance rates, and admission selectivity, the scoring method applies a multiplier that rewards academic achievement in schools that serve more challenging groups of students. The effect of this adjustment mechanism is that inner-city and open admission schools can be competitive with suburban and highly selective schools.

Returning to the aforementioned point about the integration of the various sections of the CHSHR evaluation process, it is important to note the close relation of the academics and Catholic identity dimensions. “Instruction should be authentically Catholic in content and methodology across the entire program of studies,” says Archbishop Miller. That goal is not impossible, but certainly more difficult, to reach where the faculty is not comprised predominantly of practicing Catholics. In light of this, the CHSHR survey instrument asks questions concerning the percentage of Catholic faculty and the existence of programs to enhance the faculty’s understanding of and commitment to Catholicism.

The extent to which a Catholic worldview informs the curriculum is also assessed through the civic education component of the CHSHR. That survey section asks questions concerning the knowledge and use of Catholic social teaching within the instruction of civics, government, and economics. With Archbishop Miller, the CHSHR stresses the role of theology within the curriculum by focusing on that subject in its Catholic identity component. At the same time, it also shares the prelate’s concern that “we must always take special care to avoid thinking that a Catholic school’s distinctiveness rests solely on the shoulders of its religious education program.” The CHSHR’s questions about Catholic social teaching, put to teachers of business, government, and economics, demonstrate this concern.

Even as Catholic high schools strive with varying levels of success to approach the ideal laid out by the Church’s teaching on education—and summarized by Archbishop Miller—so the CHSHR attempts imperfectly to measure this success. Over three years of operation the Honor Roll has benefited from the feedback of school administrators and others and continually improved its scoring mechanism. With the cooperation of schools, parents, and all the stakeholders in Catholic education, the CHSHR hopes to encourage Catholic high schools to approach ever closer the goal articulated so eloquently by Archbishop Miller: “An integral education aims to develop gradually every capability of every student: their intellectual, physical, psychological, moral and religious dimensions.”

Kevin Schmiesing is a research fellow at the Acton Institute and a consultant to the Catholic High School Honor Roll.