July 2024 President’s Pen with Preston Kendall

by Miranda Eby | Aug 2, 2024 | President’s Pen

Where did the summer go?  Hard to believe that August is already upon us and we will be back in full-time classes in a couple weeks.  Speaking of time just flying by, this school year will mark the 20^th anniversary of our school opening in 2004.  In that year, six new Cristo Rey schools opened at the same time.  Not something I would ever recommend repeating!  There were already four schools in operation at that time, including the original school in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood.  So, depending how you want to look at it, our school in Waukegan was either the 5^th Cristo Rey school or the 10^th or something in between.

We were going through some old photos of the opening day.  The students gathered at the local Catholic Church for mass and then afterwards, paraded along the sidewalks and on the streets to the front of the building where classes were held those first two years.  I was working at the Cristo Rey Network at that time and attended mass and walked to school with the students that day – never dreaming that, seven years later, I would come to lead this wonderful work and school community that is CRSM.  An amazing and humbling privilege!

CRSM has been through so much – good times and tough ones.  We will be celebrating our short history throughout this school year.  Not very many businesses ever make it to twenty years old.  What a blessing to have made it this far but we are just getting started!  As we look forward to our next twenty years, it is with a faith born out of many trials and many more successes.

Speaking of successes, nothing warms the heart more than being able to check in with alumni.  We have engineers, IT managers, nurses, accountants, teachers, school administrators, law enforcement, civil servants, and lawyers.  I know at least one alum in medical school.  What a gift to be able to see their dreams (and our dreams for them) coming true.  Our oldest classes were also our smallest classes, but those first pioneers are now in their mid-thirties.  Our first graduating class was only 17 seniors.  Besides their budding careers, many have started families.  Can you imagine how much fun it is to see them visit and walk the halls with strollers?  The future is even brighter; this year’s senior class has 102 students!

Our incoming freshman class of 108 students are on campus as I write, finishing up their third week of job preparation training. Total CRSM enrollment is 429 – the largest number for CRSM ever. The reason for this increase is not that we are intentionally taking larger incoming classes but because so few students are leaving during their four years with us.  Our running five-year average for retention from 9^th grade through 12^th grade and graduation is over 90%.  No other Cristo Rey school can claim this feat and few other schools anywhere, regardless of student income, can compete.  Not that it is a competition… but I think it speaks volumes about the culture our leadership, faculty, and staff work so hard to maintain – a place where students are known, valued, and can flourish.

As we look toward this school year, CRSM’s challenges are not with students and student performance.  They are primarily financial.  First, our Corporate Work Study Program is still experiencing a long-term COVID hangover as the five-day work week moves closer and closer toward extinction.  I joked with a doctor the other day that the only organizations which appear to be open and in-person five days per week (or more) are schools and hospitals.  A big part of our challenge is that, while many organizations are moving toward being in the office three days per week, the actual days they are in-person vary company-by-company and even department-by-department within some companies.  Right now, only half our students are in paying jobs.  The rest are spread among a large group of terrific non-profit organizations.  Every student has a job but the vital income work-study brings to our school operations is down by over $1.2M annually compared to pre-COVID.

In addition, the Illinois Tax Credit scholarship program known as Invest In Kids was not renewed by our state legislature.  On average, CRSM received $1M annually via scholarships for our students.  Overall, our income is down more than $2.2M annually.

Thankfully, several people who gave through the program are now pledging to give the same donation amounts despite not receiving the generous state tax credits.  God bless them! I am confident that we will be able to adjust to the changing workplace schedules and revive the Corporate Work Study Program.  Also, we are truly blessed to have so many incredibly generous benefactors who understand our situation and value the life-changing success our students are finding at CRSM.  These are challenges we will overcome.

In the meantime, I just received an email from our Admissions department.  The CRSM applications portal for 9^th graders starting in the fall of 2025 just opened-up yesterday.  We received 30 applications on the first day! And there are only 108 seats available for that class.  Our local community also clearly knows the value of a CRSM education.

Here’s looking forward to our next 20 years and beyond.  Thank you for helping make it all possible.  ¡Viva Cristo Rey!

June 2024 President’s Pen with Preston Kendall

by Miranda Eby | Jul 2, 2024 | President’s Pen

When we started the first Cristo Rey School in Chicago, there was a 24-hour diner I drove past every day, called the Steak n’ Egger.  The sign outside said, “We may doze but we never close.”   A lot of people think schools take off the summer or at least only carry a skeleton crew to run their brief summer school programs.  While that may be true for many traditional schools, it is certainly not so at Cristo Rey St. Martin College Prep.  Summer is a bustling and vibrant time for us! Last week is a great example.

Our incoming freshmen were in their third week with us for Corporate Work Study Training and our academic Summer Bridge Program.  The two mandatory programs last a combined seven weeks and that’s before we celebrate our first day of class for the coming school year! If you want to be a CRSM 9^th grader, you pretty much turn over more than half your summer to us.

Our new students occupied most of the east end of our building while the west end and cafeteria were in use for an all-girls, week-long science camp called iBIO STEMGirls.  We have hosted this group for several years.  They bring area girls from grades 3 – 8 in for a highly engaging science program.  This year’s theme was “Systems Safari” so they spent the week studying various systems of the human body – the central nervous system, digestive system, respiratory system, cardiovascular & circulatory system, etc. The camp is staffed by volunteers- some come of our CWSP Business Partners like Abbott Labs – and others are members of our local community, including CRSM students and alumni.  A pleasant surprise was discovering that a CRSM Alumna is now co-director of their organization.

On Monday, we had representatives from the Daniel Murphy Scholarship Foundation on campus interviewing prospective scholars for the inaugural year of their program with us in Lake County.  By Friday, we had received notice that 4 CRSM students will join their Class of 2028 cohort. The beginning of a beautiful friendship that will allow more students to receive a CRSM education.

Also on Monday, we hosted an evening townhall discussion for our Illinois State Senator Adriane Johnson.  Our campus is quite a showplace and we make every effort to host community events that allow other non-profits to utilize our space for their efforts.  Sen. Johnson used the evening to surface issues important to her greater Waukegan and North Chicago constituency.

Wednesday evening was another CRSM-hosted public event sponsored by the Center for Disease Control and the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. Scientists from the Agency for Toxic Substances & Disease Registry presented findings from a five-year study on Ethylene Oxide (EtO) emissions in our area.  CRSM served as an air sample collection site for the study which was prompted by two area companies who were found to be releasing EtO, a known cancer-causing agent, into the local atmosphere. Obviously, there is a lot of fear and concern surrounding this situation.  The scientific study concluded that area workers and residents face an increased risk of certain cancers like lymphoma, leukemia, and breast cancer because of emissions from 2019 – 2024 and earlier but further releases of EtO have been reduced to about 1/10^th of previous levels.

Waukegan is a heavily polluted community with five separate superfund sites identified by the EPA.  Asbestos, PCBs, heavy metals, and ammonia are all present with some leeching into the groundwater and adjacent land.  It is beyond.  Historically, areas where poorer populations live experience significantly higher pollution levels than areas with populations of higher income.  Waukegan is no exception – further proof that the economic playing field is simply not level and that manifests itself in all areas of life.

On the sunnier side of things, the very next day, on Thursday, we had a regularly scheduled meeting with our solar contractors.  A safety fence runs along the entire perimeter of our roof as workers construct a solar array there.  It will not quite fulfill our entire annual electrical needs but, on exceptionally sunny days, we may be selling energy back to the power company!  We estimate that the project will save CRSM about $100,000 every year.    We are on schedule to complete construction before our first full-day of classes on August 19.

Then on Friday, 19 CRSM students took their final exam for a Statistics class taught by a professor from Lake Forest College.  We hope this is the beginning of an expanded relationship with the college and dual-credit offerings where students earn both high school and college-level credit from the same class.

Friday afternoon saw our parking lot dotted with tents for the weekly Farmers’ Market we started at CRSM with area vendors bringing fresh produce, prepared ethnic foods, honey, cookies, etc.  Waukegan is a food desert and we are hopeful the Farmers’ Market will become a seasonal fixture for the benefit of our families and neighbors.

Finally, on Saturday, CRSM’s parking lot was the site of a community carnival to promote gun violence awareness.  Free food, ice cream, games, and bounce houses abounded, as well as informational tables from various community organizations including the Lake County State’s Attorney, healthcare providers, and CRSM’s own Admissions/Student Recruiting team.  Many alumni and CRSM families attended.

Part of CRSM’s mission is to be a transforming force in our community.  We do that by partnering with other non-profits and giving them a platform to serve our residents.  We also do it by helping our students become educated, intentional citizens who will be change agents in their community.  It’s already happening!  We saw it in the several activities taking place just last week.  What better way to promote change than by modeling positive, beneficial behaviors like our school’s community involvement efforts?

I truly believe that in the course of just one or two generations, Waukegan and North Chicago will become thriving, healthy, and prosperous communities – not by displacing our current population but by continuing to support their hopes and dreams.

¡Viva Cristo Rey!