An empty classroom at recently closed St. Cecilia’s Catholic School in Williamsburg. Ridgewood’s St. Aloysius School will close at the end of this school year.
– Photo by Aaron Short.

Students at the St. Aloysius Catholic School will have to find another option come September, as the Ridgewood school will be closing by the end of the school year.

Earlier this week, the Brooklyn Dioceses announced the closure of eleven Catholic schools, not including several proposed mergers, across Brooklyn and Queens, including Flatbush Catholic Academy, St. Vincent Ferrer, Most Precious Blood, St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, Our Lady of Perpetual Help, and Our Lady of Angels in Brooklyn, and St. Anthony of Padua, St. Benedict Joseph Labre, St. Catherine of Sienna, St. Aloysius, and Blessed Sacrament. Four schools in Williamsburg could be merging too, and some religious leaders in these neighborhoods are not happy about the proposal.

Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of the Diocese of Brooklyn said the restructuring measure was necessary because of demographic changes that continue to occur in both Brooklyn and Queens.

“I am committed to ensuring that our Catholic Schools are accessible geographically and financially to the people of our Diocese. When we determined that our schools are operating at only 85% of capacity it became clear that we had to consider why this was happening and how we might reverse the trend” said Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of the Diocese of Brooklyn.

It is not the first school closure to affect North Brooklyn residents, as St. Cecilia’s School in Greenpoint was shut in June last year after educating students for nearly 100 years. Residents were outraged and stunned at the news last Spring, though there is more advanced notice this year, allowing parents to plan on whether to enroll their children in a nearby public or private school.

The pastor of St. Aloysius Roman Catholic Church and the principal of the school were unavailable for comment, but I spoke with Monsignor Joseph Calise, who was previously stationed at St. Aloysius and is now the pastor of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel in Williamsburg. Father Calise said the closures were part of a restructuring within the Brooklyn Diocese designed to strengthen the existing schools and give the Church the opportunity to tighten up finances, have a stronger faculty, and control a uniform curriculum.

St. Aloysius School parents, if they want to keep their students within the Catholic school system, will likely have to send their children to St. Matthias School, St. Brigid’s School, or other nearby schools in Queens. Williamsburg’s Northside Catholic School may be a bit far away, though Calise said he would welcome students from St. Aloysius.

City Councilmember Diana Reyna sent out a statement blaming the closures on gentrification.