The current issue
Neighborhood Map
Bay Ridge
  • Bensonhurst, Dyker Heights
Brooklyn Heights
  • Downtown, DUMBO
Carroll Gardens
  • Cobble Hill, Red Hook, Boerum Hill
Fort Greene
  • Clinton Hill, Crown Heights
North Brooklyn
  • Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Bushwick
Park Slope
  • Prospect Heights, Windsor Terrace, Greenwood Heights
GO Brooklyn
Dining Guide
Where to GO
Events calendar
Classifieds
The Brooklyn Wire
Not Just Nets
Police Blotter
Perspective
Parenting
Politics
Transit
Podcasts
Brooklyn Cyclones
Merchant news
About The Paper
RSS Feeds
Avalon Fort Greene

Catholic school parents see only turmoil in Flanagan’s wake

By Ben Muessig
The Brooklyn Paper
Enlarge this image
The Brooklyn Paper / Ben Muessig
Parents protested in front of the Brooklyn diocese office on Greene Avenue in Fort Greene in support of St. Saviour’s principal James Flanagan, whose contract at the Park Slope school has not been renewed, despite his 25 years of service.

Tools

Print this story
digg
del.icio.us

Parents at a Park Slope Catholic school are praying that they can save a beloved principal whose career is on the line.

Families from St. Saviour Elementary School are protesting Rev. Daniel Murphy’s decision to not renew the contract of Principal James Flanagan — a popular administrator who has been in charge of the well-regarded school for 25 years.

“We’re the ones who support Catholic education, but we’re the ones being rolled over,” said Cathy Hunt, a mother of two, who has helped organize marches in front of the Eighth Avenue school and at the Brooklyn diocese headquarters in Fort Greene. “You don’t just pull out the leadership when a school is so successful.”

Hunt claims that Murphy has left families with little time to find alternative schools if they disagree with his decision.

“We’ve already put our money down and enrolled our kids — now there’s nothing we can do,” added Hunt.

Supporters of the principal claim the administrator and Murphy weren’t singing from the same hymn book on a number of issues, including a proposed tuition hike at the 104-year-old school that Flanagan opposed.

Rico Furniture

But Murphy claims parents shouldn’t fret about his decision to let Flanagan go.

“It’s a decision that I’ve made that, as we go into the future, we will move forward with different leadership,” said Murphy.

“Some parents have great fears, but I think they are unfounded. I would really want them to be at peace,” said Murphy, who said parents will likely receive more information about Flanagan’s successor by early July. “The school is going to remain strong. There is a change in the principal, but that’s the only change.”

©2009 Community Newspaper Group

←Brooklyn Angle: Ticket sales in the tank? Who you gonna call? Gersh Kuntzman!
→Podcast: A tribute to our intern, Kate Emerson!

Reader Feedback

Enter your comment below

By submitting this comment, you agree to the following terms:

You agree that you, and not BrooklynPaper.com or its affiliates, are fully responsible for the content that you post. You agree not to post any abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, hateful, threatening or sexually-oriented material or any material that may violate applicable law; doing so may lead to the removal of your post and to your being permanently banned from posting to the site. You grant to BrooklynPaper.com the royalty-free, irrevocable, perpetual and fully sublicensable license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform and display such content in whole or in part world-wide and to incorporate it in other works in any form, media or technology now known or later developed.

First name
Last name
Your neighborhood
Email address
Daytime phone

Your letter must be signed and include all of the information requested above. (Only your name and neighborhood are published with the letter.) Letters should be as brief as possible; while they may discuss any topic of interest to our readers, priority will be given to letters that relate to stories covered by The Brooklyn Paper.

Letters will be edited at the sole discretion of the editor, may be published in whole or part in any media, and upon publication become the property of The Brooklyn Paper. The earlier in the week you send your letter, the better.

Perelandra
Water Street Restaurant

Links