Our Lady of the Ridge School Saved from Closing

CHICAGO RIDGE, IL -- Thanks to a tremendous outpouring from parishioners, parents, students and community leaders, Our Lady of the Ridge School has escaped the axe and will remain open for the foreseeable future..

The Archdiocese of Chicago announced in December that it was closing Our Lady of the Ridge in Chicago Ridge and St. Alphonsus/St. Patrick School in Lemont at the end of the current academic year ,due to dwindling enrollment and budget deficits. Both schools were presented with fundraising and student enrollment targets they needed to meet to remain open.

Heroic efforts, including an impassioned plea by Chicago Ridge Mayor Chuck Tokar and OLOR graduate, saved the community’s Catholic grammar school from closing its doors.

“It was a fantastic experience going to Our Lady of the Ridge,” Tokar said in a fundraising video. “I still distinctly remember al nuns teaching in those days. Coincidentally, this is the 50th anniversary of my graduation and last year we started to plan our reunion and then this came down, the potential closing of the school.”

Tokar also cautioned that closing the parochial school would have a devastating impact on Chicago Ridge’s economy, since families from 12 different public school districts have children enrolled at the school and patronize village businesses.

Our Lady of the Ridge presently has 103 students enrolled in grades K-8. and raised close to the $250,000 benchmark set by the archdiocese for it to remain open. The school also enrolled 114 new students for the 2017-2018 school year.

Supporters held a “Save Our Lady of Ridge School” fundraiser earlier this month at 115 Bourbon Street in Merrionette Park.

Efforts continue to make the 60-year-old parochial school financially solvent in the future.

Lemont’s St. Alphonsus/St. Patrick grammar school also met the archdiocese’s enrollment and funrdaising goals.

St. Louis de Montfort in Oak Lawn, and St. Joseph School in Homewood are still slated to close in June.