San Miguel Model

La Salle Academy is based on a unique, transformative, and successful model for elementary and middle schools, The San Miguel School model. San Miguel Schools are small elementary and middle schools serving a population that is at or below the poverty line. These schools are not tuition dependent.  La Salle Academy parents and guardians pay only $200 annually; Academy benefactors provide for the school’s operation.  La Salle Academy is open to students of all faith, cultures and backgrounds.

San Miguel Schools have been working in conjunction with Nativity schools, a related model, for more than 30 years.  San Miguel and Nativity Schools continue to spread throughout the country in response to the need for quality, small schools in urban communities. La Salle Academy is a recent addition to a fast-growing number of San Miguel and Nativity Schools across the United States.  The NativityMiguel Network of Schools has been organized to support and cultivate the growth of these schools. La Salle Academy draws on, and contributes to, the infectious energy of a movement that has national implications for the direction of Catholic education in economically distressed neighborhoods.

 

NativityMiguel schools are founded according to a set of guiding principles:

• non-tuition driven; families typically pay a nominal fee/tuition each year.
• small class size and small school communities
• faith-based
• extended day
• extended year
• parent/family involvement
• graduate mentoring and college counseling
• flexible environment to meet students’ needs.

 

Oftentimes, students enter with below grade level skills, yet typically perform either at or above grade level by graduation. Graduates are placed in quality high schools and are provided with critical academic resources, financial support and personal guidance through high school and into college through the efforts of their school's Graduate Support Program.  Countrywide data has shown that the Nativity and Miguel models succeed in educating those most at-risk.  Nearly 90% of Nativity and Miguel alumni graduate from high school in four years.  Over 75% of these students enroll in two-year or four-year colleges and universities.

Overview and History of the Nativity and San Miguel Models

The NativityMiguel School movement began with one school over 30 years ago and continues to spread throughout the country in response to the need for such schools in urban communities.

The Network was established after an exponential growth of the NativityMiguel School model, a growth which began in 1993.  The first Nativity School opened in 1971 in the lower east side of Manhattan with the mission of providing high quality education to middle school age boys who had the potential to succeed academically, but who had no alternative to their troubled public school.  To make up for the grade level deficit the boys exhibited, the school day was lengthened and the year extended.  In addition, a graduate support system was established to follow the graduates through high school to ensure the boys kept up with the study habits and work ethic instilled while at Nativity.

The effectiveness of the model was seen in the number of alumni graduating from high school and going on to college.  Word spread among educators committed to providing children growing up in impoverished central city neighborhoods with a high quality education, an education that helps break the cycle of poverty.

Today there are 64 NativityMiguel Schools serving over 4,300 middle school age boys and girls in 27 states.  Approximately 90% of the students attending NativityMiguel Schools qualify for the Federal Government's Free and Reduced Cost Lunch program, an indication that a family is living at or near poverty.  Actually 53% of the students are African American; another 37% are Latino.

Noting that many inner-city schools have dropout rates of 50% or more, NativityMiguel model schools have succeeded where so many others fail.  Ninety-two percent (92%) of our students graduate from high school, as compared to the national rate for African-American and Latino students of 55%, and the four-year dropout rate for the network's high school graduation class this year was 6 percent, and 96 percent enrolled in a two- or four-year college this fall.

Our schools provide a safe place to learn and keep the students away from the dangerous influences on their neighborhood streets.

The NativityMiguel Network strives to increase the capacity of these schools, and future schools, to continue to provide the kind of education that will make a lasting difference in the lives of the children we are privileged to teach and counsel.

To learn more about the NativityMiguel Model, the network, and the successes of the schools in our network, please visit:  http://www.nativitymiguelschools.org