ALICE TERRELL opens the door to Miss Hargrove%26#8217;s first grade at Blessed Sacrament School, where nine children sit attentively at desks arranged like pieces on a checkerboard. The room is huge and they are tiny, but the 92-year-old school was built when Catholic education was flourishing and a typical classroom held 40 students. These days, with a total enrollment of 95 in Grades K-8, Blessed Sacrament is a ghost of its former self.%26#8220;Good morning,%26#8221; says Miss Terrell, the academic director, who, as a Methodist, cannot hold the title of principal. %26#8220;Good morning Miss Terrell, and God bless you,%26#8221; nine high-pitched voices reply in unison. Such are the daily rituals at this school, which are about to end. With enrollment far below 225, considered a healthy number for a school in the Archdiocese of Newark, Blessed Sacrament will close for good in June. A charter school plans to take over the building. As the weather warms and Catholic schools in New Jersey prepare for Pope Benedict XVI%26#8217;s impending visits to Washington and New York, it is a bittersweet spring for Blessed Sacrament%26#8217;s shaken families and staff. Many have no idea where they will go.The closing has also left others in Catholic education with a lump in their throats.%26#8220;It%26#8217;s a loss for all of us %26#151; a door for evangelizing has closed,%26#8221; said Everlyn Hay, principal of Queen of Angels School, about a mile away. With about 200 students, Queen of Angels is not in danger; its enrollment may even grow if it absorbs some of Blessed Sacrament%26#8217;s stranded students. But over the last decade the archdiocese, covering Bergen, Hudson, Essex and Union Counties, has closed one-fourth of its schools. After Blessed Sacrament closes, the archdiocese will have seven elementary schools.Mrs. Hay, an usher at Queen of Angels Church, founded in 1930 as the first African-American Catholic congregation in Newark, is a realist.%26#8220;I%26#8217;ll be truthful %26#151; the moment enrollment starts dipping, we start worrying,%26#8221; she said early this month. %26#8220;Right now we have families losing their jobs left and right. We ask each other: %26#8216;Who%26#8217;s next?%26#8217; %26#8221;Blessed Sacrament, in the city%26#8217;s South Ward, and Queen of Angels, in the Central Ward, are close cousins in many ways. But only one will survive past the end of this school year.Both schools have proud histories and fiercely loyal adherents. Even though they are not likely to be Catholic, many African-American parents who live or work in Newark consider the two schools preferable to public schools. Ask why, and the parents are likely to say the Catholic schools are safer and academically superior. They also praise teachers as %26#8220;like family%26#8221; and unusually dedicated.%26#8220;The public schools are too dangerous,%26#8221; said Charles Treadwell, a transportation company owner in Newark who graduated from Queen of Angels in 1984 and sent all four of his children there. %26#8220;A teacher cannot effectively teach when she has one or two children who constantly disrupt the class. At Queen of Angels, that is not going to happen. It%26#8217;s run the old-school way, caring but stern. If you go there you%26#8217;re going to stay focused, you will learn, and you will succeed.%26#8221;Fewer than 10 percent of students at Blessed Sacrament and Queen of Angels are Catholic, and fewer still attend their school%26#8217;s parish church. Still, religion permeates both places, through instruction in faith and twice-daily prayers. Both schools struggle without subsidies from the diocese. They receive certain services and supplies from the State Department of Education, but they are financed largely through tuition and other fees. Both employ lay staff and could use more. Blessed Sacrament has no librarian or music teacher, and the gym teacher is part time; at Queen of Angels, Mrs. Hay herself grabs a crossing guard%26#8217;s vest, whistle and stop sign to lead students to the playground, a barren patch of sloping blacktop across a street. A volunteer travels daily from Manhattan to help at lunch. 1 2 Next Page %26#x00bb;
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