A web poll conducted by the Courier Post last month found 83% of respondents agreed with the recent school reconfiguration decisions announced by the Diocese.
1,782 online votes were cast in response to the question, “Do you think the Camden Diocese is right to merge schools with shrinking enrollments?”
The results of the online survey were published in the December 15 edition of the Courier Post.
Diocesan spokesman Andrew Walton said that while there is a growing appreciation as to why the reconfigurations were necessary, the decisions still have been painful.
“While there is public support for the decisions, we know that the pain of the decisions is very real and will not ease overnight. For this reason, we will work closely with affected school communities to help guide them through these difficult decisions and to ease the transitions that are ahead,” he said.
The diocese announced November 29 that one school would close and eight others would merge with neighboring schools at the end of the school year in June as a result of declining enrollments.
The Catholic Schools Office of the diocese has provided advice and guidelines to affected schools to help facilitate the reconfigurations.