Farewell, Wildwood Catholic High School

The shocker came today: WCHS will close at the end of this school year.

I first heard this last night and thought, no way. It couldn't. But then my sister, in tears, called me when she left school this afternoon, where the administration told the students that WCHS will not reopen next year.

Although a shock, this didn't come as a complete surprise. Catholic's declining enrollment has been a hot topic for a couple years. When I was a senior, there were 336 students attending WCHS. This year, just five years after I graduated, there are only 194 students enrolled in the school. Why the decline? Tuition prices are most likely to blame. Many people have moved out of Cape May County too. You lose students, so what do you do to compensate for that lost money? You raise tuition. In turn, that increased tuition will further cause "lost money" because kids won't go there because it's too expensive. It's a lose-lose situation.

I am so sad. I had the opportunity to enjoy its halls and master my education there, as did my brother Bill. I simply took for granted that Kate, Joe, and Julia would get that same opportunity. I feel for Kate and those kids who now have to make a critical decision of where they will continue their education. For Katie who is currently a sophomore, these next two years of her schooling are the most important because they are the years before college. I feel for my brother Joe, who graduates from the 8th grade this year at Margaret Mace Elementary, because he was looking forward to attending Catholic. He made a ton of friends while performing in WCHS plays and now he won't go to school with them. I also feel for Julia, because Catholic will slowly become a fading memory by the time she reaches high school. Chris and I often said that if we ever moved to North Wildwood, our children would go to WCHS to get an excellent private education. That's done too.

Even though I am LDS, I attended Wildwood Catholic High School in North Wildwood, NJ because it offers the best education in my area. I LOVE that school. Sure, there were occasional days when I hated the school building, mostly because there was an AP Calculus test or a Physics lab waiting for me inside. There were those first days of my freshman year when I didn't want to go to Catholic, mainly because I missed the familiarity of grade school.

But I LOVED going to Catholic and I loved all the memories I made there. I loved the lunch table conversations, the jibes with subs, the student-teacher friendships, the fall plays, the sports, the EVERYTHING. I loved it all and I would do it again in a heartbeat.

Since I have graduated, I've been able to visit a few times and I always smile because at Catholic, I created a name for myself and I made an effort to enjoy the moments I spent in its classrooms. Yes, our bathrooms were shady and our lockers rusty, but what Catholic school doesn't have those qualities?

To Wildwood Catholic High School, thank you for four years of challenge, excitement, fun, friends, for the learning, the living, and the loving. I will truly miss walking down your halls and I am sad for those who will no longer be able to do so.