​a word from OUR SUPERINTENDENT

Welcome to the Kansas City-St. Joseph Diocese (KCSJ) Catholic School Office webpage!  School will be starting is just a few short weeks and we are in the process of preparing for the new and exciting year.  Besides the many day-to-day “miracles” that occur in our schools, there are some particularly impressive ones that will be happening during the 2019-20 school year. 

*If you are new to KCSJ diocese and want more information about our Catholic schools, please feel free to further explore our webpage or give me a call directly.

​Dr. Daniel Peters

​Superintendent
of  Schools

​Diocese of
​Kansa City ~ St. Joseph

ph: (816) 714-2344

email

Welcome to the Kansas City-St. Joseph Diocese (KCSJ) Catholic School Office webpage!  School will be starting is just a few short weeks and we are in the process of preparing for the new and exciting year.  Besides the many day-to-day “miracles” that occur in our schools, there are some particularly impressive ones that will be happening during the 2019-20 school year. 

*If you are new to KCSJ diocese and want more information about our Catholic schools, please feel free to further explore our webpage or give me a call (816-714-2344).

Restorative Justice: 

• During two 2-day sessions, teachers and administrators will be trained on a restorative justice model providing a very Catholic means to handling situations within our school when students make less than perfect decisions.  Sometimes students say or do things to each other that are harmful to both the victim and the offender.  The restorative justice model seeks to make both the victim and the offender “whole”.   Even the offender has to be restored to good graces with him/herself, the victim, and God.  Our teachers and administrators understand how special each student is and how each student brings a different set of gifts, talents, and weaknesses to life.  During this training, teachers and administrators will learn some new tools to honor the specialness of each student.

Benchmark Assessments: 

• During the 2018-19 school year, a newly developed math benchmark assessments for grades 3rd through 8th were piloted.  Each benchmark assessment is from 25-30 questions and is designed to be taken by the student in less than an hour and assesses the critical math standards for that grade level. The 3rd and 8th grade students will take the assessments once at the beginning of the school year, once in January, and then a third time in May.  The benchmark assessment is used both as a formative and summative assessment, meaning the results of the assessment are used by teachers to direct their instruction (formative) and the results are used to evaluate how well the students are mastering the critical math standards for each grade level (summative).  The results are also used to direct the professional development teachers need, the kind of textbooks and curriculum materials we use, and the setting of annual goals.

Accreditation:

• All of the diocesan schools are accredited.  Accreditation is earned through AdvancEd and Missouri Non-Public.  Every five years, the diocesan school system is visited by a team of expert educators from all over the country to evaluate how effectively we are adhering to research-based best practices.  At the end of their visit, they determine if we are worthy of their accreditation and identify what the diocesan schools should do to get better.  In between visits, the Catholic School Office requires each school to do an annual data-based, self-assessment using student assessment results, student; parent, and staff surveys and inventories; as well as extensive classroom visits using the ELEOT observation tool.  In addition, each school is subject to an intensive 2-day evaluation by a visiting team composed of local educational experts.  The 2019-20 school year is the fourth year of the 5-year cycle.  All Early Child Hood Centers and diocesan high schools will be evaluated this year.  Next year, the school system will start the process over and be visited by a team of expert educators.

If you have further questions or suggestions on how we can improve, please feel free to contact us:
     eMail:     peters@diocesekcsj.org
     Phone:   (816-714-2344).


Dr. Daniel Peters
Superintendent of Schools
Diocese of Kansas City ~ St. Joseph