March 3, 2021

By Darcy Fargo & Deacon Kevin Mastellon
North Country Catholic

Last week, the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation announced it was awarding a round of more than 400 grants totaling $115 million to programs serving vulnerable New Yorkers across the state, and schools within the Diocese of Ogdensburg were among the grant recipients.

Immaculate Heart Central in Watertown, St. James School in Gouverneur and Trinity Catholic School in Massena were each awarded $75,000 to offer counseling services.

“We’re able to add an elementary school counselor to help kids manage stress and personal issues,” said Teresa Lucas, business manager for Immaculate Heart Central (IHC). “This counselor will be able to help teachers, as well.”

Lucas said IHC already had guidance counselors serving students in middle school and high school, but the school had never been able to offer counseling services to its youngest students.

“We’re now able to offer them that type of care throughout their time at IHC,” said Lucas. “We’re calling the project, ‘Sustained Hope for the Future.’”

St. James School’s new school counselor begins work this week.

“We’re very thankful we were able to get this grant and that we’re able to offer these services to our students,” said Jeanne Sweeney, bookkeeper and secretary for St. James Parish and School.

Trinity Catholic School has hired a licensed social worker/therapist to its staff, as well.

“This has been a difficult year, not only for the students, but also for the teachers,” said Trinity Principal Joyce Giroux. “There’s been a lot of stress and anxiety. The counselor can offer individual or group work with children as they deal with loneliness, issues related to quarantine and anxiety, and the counselor can work with the teachers, who have been dealing with overwhelming stress of teaching remotely and the uncertainty of not knowing who will be in class on any given day.”

Giroux said the school had hoped to hire a counselor for years, but it wasn’t feasible within the existing budget.
“It was in our five-year plan to hire a counselor, but it was a lofty goal,” she said. “This gave us the funding to do it. And it rounds out our staff to complete. We have a counselor from Citizen Advocates that comes in one day a week, and now we can offer that service on a much more regular basis with our own counselor.”

Augustinian Academy in Carthage received $75,000 to establish “Wholistic and Healthy Activities for After School Programs.”

“We are so excited!” Principal Mary Ann Margrey exclaimed.

The after-school program envisioned by the Augustinian team will have a different theme each month. The first students will be exposed to a STEM (science, technology, engineering & mathematics) computer technology program using LEGOS. Future activities will feature dance classes, martial arts and other disciplines the children have expressed a desire to pursue.

After school classes begin soon on Monday and Wednesday from 3 to 4 p.m.

“We have a large military population,” Margrey said. “So, an after-school program is important to them. But we will address the needs of all our families and will eventually reach out to the wider community and connect with lower income families, whether they are part of the Augustinian Academy family or not.”

St. Agnes School in Lake Placid received $75,000 for a “Gap Services” program.

“We’re an early education environment here,” explained St. Agnes Principal Catherine Bemis. “This will allow us to provide supports to students who have areas of need, but don’t qualify for special education services. We see it all the time. Through assessments and teacher observations and data collection, we’ll be able to identify students who could benefit from occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech, counseling services, sensory-motor integration. We’ll be able to provide those students with services and try to address any gaps.”

Bemis said St. Agnes School has offered limited gap services up to this point.

“We were funding it on a limited capacity through our budget,” she said. “This grant allows us to expand those services for all students in a way we wouldn’t otherwise be financially able to.”

The school will offer the students by contracting with the providers for each respective service.

“We are so very grateful to the Cabrini Foundation for this grant,” said Bemis. “It will allow us to meet our mission and support the needs of all learners, regardless of where they are in their learning path. It’s really special, and we feel a lot of excitement about what this is going to do. In a normal year, this would be an amazing opportunity. Now, with the pandemic, the delays are even more significant, and the needs are different. The students who were behind are even more behind. This will really help us set them up for success.”
Seton Catholic was also awarded $75,000 for nursing services and its After-School Program.

“We had an existing school nurse, and that position was funded with funding from the public school system,” explained Seton Business Manager Christine Boulé. “The funding from the public school had been reduced. This helped us bridge that gap.”

Boulé said the school has also had to increase the size of its after-school-care staff to serve all the students in need of care while meeting the required COVID protocols.

“To meet social distancing requirements, we needed additional staff,” Boulé said. “This grant enabled us to serve more kids than we would’ve been able to otherwise. It also provided snacks for the program. We can offer a safe place for kids, ensure they’re fed, and ensure we’re complying with all COVID protocols.”

The Mother Cabrini Health Foundation is one of the largest foundations in the United States and the largest foundation focused exclusively on New York State. The Foundation originated from the 2018 sale of Fidelis Care, a nonprofit health insurer, inspired by the bishops of the Catholic diocese to increase healthcare access for New York’s poor.