Sacred Heart pursues new paths this year
Pastor discusses new advisory council, initiatives
BY JACQUELINE DURETT Correspondent

SOUTH AMBOY — The Rev. Joseph Romanoski is looking to the community to help make Sacred Heart School a better place.

This year the elementary school, which opened for the year on Sept. 1, is in the process of forming an advisory board to get community input on issues such as fundraising, building, grounds and maintenance, said Romanoski, pastor of Sacred Heart Church. The school will benefit from this board, he said, as its members look at "what other great ideas might be out there," he said.

The advisory board, which will number about a dozen and contain subcommittees, is still being created, Romanoski said. It will likely include a parent or two, but also people from the community. He said community members have volunteered to serve in positions like this in the past, and now the school wants to take them up on their offers.

The advisory board concept came through the Diocese of Metuchen, which had suggested schools under its jurisdiction, like Sacred Heart, develop these boards more than a year ago. But since the school had an interim principal, Michael Poll, last year, the school opted to wait until the administration was firmly in place, he said. Poll, who came out of retirement to take the position, declined the full-time position and returned to retirement.

"He did a wonderful job," Romanoski said.

And now that the school has a new principal, Sister Marie Connolly, who was previously principal of St. Joseph Elementary School in Keyport, the advisory board will work closely with her, Romanoski said. Her decades of experience are an asset to the school, he stressed.

Romanoski also said some students from the now-closed St. Joseph, a Diocese of Trenton school, have opted to start attending Sacred Heart.

"They're coming from all over," Romanoski said of the school's students, adding that he's happy with this year's enrollment figures. Although an exact number was unavailable, Romanoski said enrollment was more than 200, and "anything over 200 for me is good."

This year, Romanoski said the school will be looking for opportunities to upgrade its technology.

"I think that's what Sister [Marie] wants to develop," he said. However, he stressed that training teachers how to use new technologies like whiteboards is important as well. "If a teacher doesn't know how to use it, it's just going to sit there and collect dust," he said.

Students won't just be learning how to use different technologies this year; they'll also be getting a sense of global issues. Students will be fundraising with the intention of building a well in an African community. The project also was a recommendation from the Diocese of Metuchen, Romanoski said.

In the long term, Romanoski is hoping to forge a closer bond with the city's Catholic high school, Cardinal McCarrick. He said that he expects one of the new advisory council's suggestions will be to find ways to do that.

"We need to see it as not us and them, but us," he said. And with Cardinal McCarrick's partnership with St. Peter's College in Jersey City, Romanoski sees how Sacred Heart children can spend their entire educational lives within the Catholic school system.

R

omanoski said it's unusual for a city

like South Amboy to have both a Catholic elementary and high school.

"I do see a lot more happening in the town with Catholic education," he said.

He's also looking at perhaps doing something with the former St. Mary's elementary school facility, a school the Diocese once thought would merge with Sacred Heart.

"I'm seeing the building as a possibility as we go forward," he said.

And since Romanoski's position is up for renewal every six years, he's looking to do all he can to ensure as much as his vision as possible is realized. But he said he's happy in the role he's in.

"I've been happy to be part of it for the last 16," he said. If asked to continue, he said, "I have no problem with that."