Private Schooling is Increasing
Diocesan Press Service. August 9, 1965 [XXXIV-18]
By 1960 at least one out of every six students was studying in non- public schools. In the decades following World War II enrollment in these schools has grown four times faster than in public schools. While Episcopal schools constitute only a small proportion of all private schools, they include a large variety of institutions: parish day schools recently established, boarding schools, etc.
Diocesan and state groups of the National Association of Episcopal Schools are now attempting to establish criteria which will insure that all these schools offer the best quality education possible. This year an official criteria for evaluating church-related schools was adopted by the NAES and is now available for use by all schools. This work was prepared by the Division of Boarding and Day Schools of the Diocese of New York and used experimentally in three elementary and three secondary schools there.
In these schools there are often extensive scholarship programs which help insure that student bodies cross all economic and racial lines. Possibly the best known plan for financial assistance is the one introduced by the founder of Kent School, Kent Connecticut in 1906. Under the so-called sliding scale tuition plan parents are expected to make an annual payment to the school budget which represents a fair share of the family's resources. St. Mark's in Southborough, Mass. awarded scholarships of $53, 000 in varying amounts to 50 of its 206 students. At Groton, Groton, Mass., 58 boys in a student body of 202 received $81,215 in amounts varying from $300 to $2, 300: and 121 boys at St. Paul's School in New Hampshire received grants last year totally $194, 150.
Many day schools also have extensive scholarship programs. In the 13 schools located in the Diocese of New York, for example, almost 25 percent of the student bodies are on scholarships.