Dear Alumni,

I’ve always loved St. Joseph School. It’s my alma mater and I’ve always considered it home. I know these are sentiments that I share with many of you. As I walk into the building each morning, I am reminded of the amazing opportunity I have to serve as principal of such a fine school. It is with pride and excitement that I write to share the good news of our alma mater.

Since the days when you and I were here, we’ve gotten much smaller. Back in the 60’s and 70’s there was close to 1,000 students! We were crammed into any nook and cranny there was! Today we have more space but believe it or not, we are still using every part of the building, and boy does our building look good! We have a total of 159 students from PreS-8^th grade, and our enrollment seems to be stabilizing. My goal is to get enrollment somewhere around the 200 mark. We are small but mighty. Our children perform at the diocesan level or above when it comes to standardized tests while being involved in many extra-curricular activities. In addition to the 3R’s our students participate in Art, Spanish, Music, Physical Education, and Computer for grades K-8. We also have an Algebra I teacher for those 8^th graders who qualify, this allows them to go right into the honors program when they go into high school.

We ask ourselves why Catholic Schools were such a force years ago, and now seem to be struggling? Here are several reasons for the decline in enrollment: Demographics in the area have changed. The number of children each family is having is decreasing. There are many area public systems that provide a good education and have state of the art buildings. Tuition is something many of our parents never had to worry about. One thing that makes St. Joseph School unique and will never change is our ability to talk about God. It not only makes us unique, but we can help reinforce what our parents are trying to get across to their children, that God is first in their lives and that all things can be accomplished with His help.

I’m sure you have all received the flyer we sent out requesting money. I hope this becomes a yearly event. I’ve heard, over the years, many people say “it’s my grade school years I look back on and remember with fondness.” Please be generous when thinking about St. Joseph School. As you saw in the flyer we would like to establish an Alumni Scholarship fund in addition to other technology improvements in our classrooms. One dream is to build a gym, at this time all our sports teams have to rent gym time as well as many Catholic Schools in the area have gyms of their own. There are many families that would love to be able to provide a Catholic education for their student but maybe they don’t have the funds. That’s where you can make a difference in someone’s life. If you’d like to “adopt” a student, buy paying their tuition or part of the tuition please call the school office at 330-454-9787. We look forward to hearing from you.

Best Wishes from the “best” school in Canton,

Mrs. Joellen Maccora Esber