AUDIO: St. Mary's Catholic School Open; Striving For Viability, Sustainability

Thursday, January 31, 2019 at 4:33 PM

St. Mary's principal Bob Brookbank joined Bubba Bo for an interview this week.

St. Mary's Catholic School principal Bob Brookbank celebrates the announcement that the school will stay open past the 2018-19 school year. File photo.

(Aurora, Ind.) – It has been tabbed the “Miracle of St. Mary’s.”

Last October, St. Mary’s Catholic School in Aurora was given a December 31 deadline to raise $400,000 to keep their doors open. The school had been borrowing from the Archdiocese of Indianapolis just to make payroll.

Even though there wasn't much time to get the job done, the school was able to reach their fundraising goal.

Principal Bob Brookbank says the school was able to reach that goal thanks to great community support and commitment from alumni.

Brookbank added that the school’s grassroots campaign helped bring in about $100,000. The school sent out 400 letters to alumni and had “keep the doors open” put on Aurora Utility bills.

The rest of the fundraising was primarily done by three or four families that have strong ties with St. Mary’s Catholic School.

“Commitment is a good way of putting it due to the long-standing association with St. Mary’s through being students and closely associated their whole lives,” Brookbank said. “We just keep working and obviously it came to the successful end and it sure made Christmas.

HEAR BUBBA BO'S FULL INTERVIEW WITH BOB BROOKBANK IN THE AUDIO PLAYER BELOW

The stress of keeping the school open has subsided, but school officials are working to improve viability and sustainability.

“Right now a lot of exciting things where myself and a lot of other individuals are revamping the academic curriculum,” Brookbank said. “I am definitely on the recruiting trail. We need to obviously get more pupils in the seats which tuition keeps the three to five-year viability plan that I’m going to put in place with a lot of help from parishioners that have talent in the financial area to prove to the Archdiocese that we are sustainable.”

With that, St. Mary’s will be participating in Catholic School Week, which includes different themes and guest speakers such as John Popovich of WCPO, several alumni and Wild Science, a STEM educational program.

St. Mary School Needs A Miracle