BiblioVault - Books about Catholic schools

A Bad and Stupid Girl

Jean McGarry

University of Michigan Press, 2006

Siri is a legacy admission, rich and spoiled and destined to flunk out of her freshman year at college. Esther, her roommate, is a scholarship student from humble means, brilliant and driven to succeed.

Brought together by chance, the girls soon become partners in a struggle to find their way in a world where neither Esther’s brains nor Siri’s beauty is enough. Never having been forced to work hard at anything, Siri must rely on Esther to teach her to learn and attend class. But as Siri wakes from her dream world to discover the life of the mind, Esther begins shedding her rational bonds to explore the mysteries of the soul. For both, some of the most devastating lessons in the attainment of worldly knowledge come from love.

Deadpan funny and bittersweet, A Bad and Stupid Girl is above all else a moving portrait of two friends helping each other to uncover the potential splendor of their lives.

Jean McGarry is the author of six previous books of fiction: Airs of Providence, The Very Rich Hours, The Courage of Girls, Home at Last, Gallagher's Travels, and Dream Date. She is a professor of fiction at The Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University. A Bad and Stupid Girl is her third novel.

“Jean McGarry's novel is a lovely locket of a book, with the picture inside not at all faded. Focused in close-up, succinct and convincing, it's a story about friendship and maturation, and about how our studies, alone, do not define us.”
—Ann Beattie

“Jean McGarry’s A Bad and Stupid Girl is an uncommonly Good and Bright-Indeed Novel, sharply written from start to finish and entertaining as Hell.”
—John Barth

“Everything in life is arbitrary yet must be over-determined in literature. Jean McGarry knows how to tell a persuasive tale illuminating these truths.”
—Harold Bloom

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Cross Purposes

Pierce v. Society of Sisters and the Struggle over Compulsory Public Education

Paula Abrams

University of Michigan Press, 2009

"A definitive study of an extremely important, though curiously neglected, Supreme Court decision, Pierce v. Society of Sisters."
---Robert O'Neil, Professor of Law Emeritus, University of Virginia School of Law

"A careful and captivating examination of a dramatic and instructive clash between nationalism and religious pluralism, and of the ancient but ongoing struggle for control over the education of children and the formation of citizens."
---Richard W. Garnett, Professor of Law and Associate Dean, Notre Dame Law School

"A well-written, well-researched blend of law, politics, and history."
---Joan DelFattore, Professor of English and Legal Studies, University of Delaware

In 1922, the people of Oregon passed legislation requiring all children to attend public schools. For the nativists and progressives who had campaigned for the Oregon School Bill, it marked the first victory in a national campaign to homogenize education---and ultimately the populace. Private schools, both secular and religious, vowed to challenge the law. The Catholic Church, the largest provider of private education in the country and the primary target of the Ku Klux Klan campaign, stepped forward to lead the fight all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In Pierce v. Society of Sisters (1925), the court declared the Oregon School Bill unconstitutional and ruled that parents have the right to determine how their children should be educated. Since then, Pierce has provided a precedent in many cases pitting parents against the state.

Paula Abrams is Professor of Constitutional Law at Lewis & Clark Law School.

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Lost Classroom, Lost Community

Catholic Schools' Importance in Urban America

Margaret F. Brinig and Nicole Stelle Garnett

University of Chicago Press, 2014

In the past two decades in the United States, more than 1,600 Catholic elementary and secondary schools have closed, and more than 4,500 charter schools—public schools that are often privately operated and freed from certain regulations—have opened, many in urban areas. With a particular emphasis on Catholic school closures, Lost Classroom, Lost Community examines the implications of these dramatic shifts in the urban educational landscape.

More than just educational institutions, Catholic schools promote the development of social capital—the social networks and mutual trust that form the foundation of safe and cohesive communities. Drawing on data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods and crime reports collected at the police beat or census tract level in Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles, Margaret F. Brinig and Nicole Stelle Garnett demonstrate that the loss of Catholic schools triggers disorder, crime, and an overall decline in community cohesiveness, and suggest that new charter schools fail to fill the gaps left behind.

This book shows that the closing of Catholic schools harms the very communities they were created to bring together and serve, and it will have vital implications for both education and policing policy debates.

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Renewing the Mind

Ryan N.S. Topping

Catholic University of America Press, 2015

Renewing the Mind includes an introductory essay on the history and renewal of Catholic education, followed by 38 selections each with an introduction, biography, and study questions; adorning the text throughout are illustrations from the National Gallery of Art. Educators of children and college students will find this an essential guide to the best of what has been said about what it means to be conformed to the mind of Christ.

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Thomas Shields and the Renewal of Catholic Education

Leonardo Franchi

Catholic University of America Press, 2023

This book explores the contribution of the Rev Dr Thomas Shields (1862-1921) to Catholic education in the United States of America in the late 19th and early 20th century. Fr Shields was a pioneer in combining a career as an academic in Catholic University of America with the publication of many resources for schools. Given his pioneering role in aligning Catholic educational thought with emerging insights in the sciences, and his multi-layered commitment to Catholic education as scholar, author of textbooks and founder of initiatives in the field of Teacher Education, it seems fitting that his considerable body of work should be the subject of fresh scholarly investigation. The book is in five parts. Part 1, “Catholicism as an Educational Movement”, sets out the contours of the intellectual climate in which Shields operated and presents Catholicism as a dynamic educational movement. Part 2, “Responding to Progressive Thought”, explores the relationship between Progressivism and Catholic Education, showing how the Catholic Church responded to the challenges presented by Progressive thought. Part 3, “Shields and the Reform of Pedagogy”, examines both Shields’ general pedagogical principles and how they relate to Catholic education. Part 4, “Forming Teachers in Heart and Mind”, considers Shields’ ideas on Catholic Teacher Formation, exploring issues such as culture, vocation, method and curriculum. Part 5, “The Catholic Education Series”, explores selected examples from Shields’ Catholic Education Series to identify how his material for schools reflected, to a greater or lesser extent, his wider educational ideas. As the present age is also witness to considerable and deep-rooted challenges to Catholic education and, indeed to the Catholic understanding of the human person, Shields’ work will inspire contemporary reform-minded Catholic educators to reassess and develop the mission of Catholic education in light of the traditions of the Church.

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