Religious day schools see financial need

Religious day schools are facing increased demand for scholarship assistance as the parents of their students lose jobs. I have a story in today's paper. An excerpt:

"Religious day schools in Greater Boston, some of which had been enjoying strong growth in recent years, are reporting increased requests for financial aid from families hurt by the recession and concerns about potential drops in enrollment.

The area's Jewish community last week became the first to act collectively, announcing $2 million from a national foundation to provide emergency scholarship aid to families whose children attend one of the area's 14 Jewish day schools or many Jewish summer camps and preschools.

The major source of financial aid for Catholic school students, the Catholic Schools Foundation, says its fund-raising is down by 15 percent, while requests for emergency aid from families in which a parent has lost a job or had work hours cut are spiking.

The situation facing religious schools is similar to that facing nonreligious private schools and colleges, all of which are far more expensive than the public alternatives.

'Every school and camp are reporting significant increases in the numbers of students and campers and preschool families needing scholarships,' said Barry Shrage, the president of Combined Jewish Philanthropies. 'We have hit a massive recession that looks like it's going to hit all segments of the community, from the poorest, who are already on scholarship, to the people in the middle class and upper-middle class, who never needed help before but now are fully unemployed.'"

(Photo, by Aram Boghosian for the Globe, shows Orna Siegel, the director of admissions at Gann Academy, a Jewish high school in Waltham, looking over files in her office on 3/20/09.)