Reform in Catholic School Board Governance

Reform in Catholic School Board Governance presents a treatise on the contributions made by Monsignor Charles ONeil DAmour in Catholic school governance reforms. The model created by Msgr. DAmour served as a prototype for the governance of Catholic schools and religious education programs. As a Catholic schools administrator and advocate, Msgr. DAmour focused on the need for inclusion of religious and laity in Catholic school boards at the diocesan and parish levels, recasting of school board governance structures, and the national implications of the new practices for Catholic school boards.

The structures of parochialism that once served a good purpose were now working counter to the cultural demands of a formative and collaborative society. He referred to this basic structural reform as recasting. He feared that what was working now would not work for long. The existing parochialism called for a more inclusive approach to problem solving if American Catholic schools were to meet their crises head on. Survival was at stake!

Catholic elementary and secondary schools in the United States are presently in crisis. These educational institutions have made great contributions toward shaping American society. Today, it is imperative to examine the prevalent conditions for their survival.

Gloria Ann Kalbfleisch completed all of her formal education in Catholic institutions of learning and received her degrees from Marquette University and University of Detroit Mercy. She is the author of A Perspective: Organizational and Procedural Norms and the Authority of the Magisterium in the Catholic Church (Oxford Round Table, Forum on Public Policy Online.) By invitation, she presented her work at the international Oxford Round Table, UK. The article Diocese of Marquette Programs Overcome Distance and Isolation is published in Momentum, a publication of the National Catholic Education Association. She is an NCEA Scholar.