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Nativity School
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The Campaign for Church of the
Nativity & Nativity School
Looking to the Future
The Church of the
Nativity and its school, Nativity School, in Menlo Park, California are
embarking on an exciting, ambitious, six-year renovation effort and are
seeking financial assistance in this venture. This program
initially focuses on replacement of obsolete buildings on the
elementary school campus. The next phases involve updates to the
135 year-old church and grounds, and a new classroom facility for the
school.
Phase
1: Multi-use facility and new Kindergarten for Nativity School
“The mission of Nativity
School is to educate and prepare the whole child within a nurturing
environment based on Catholic values and beliefs in order that the
child may become a responsible and active member of the Church and
society”
Nativity School was
founded in 1956. Nativity serves 300 children in grades K-8 from parish
and non-parish families, as well as from non-Catholic families in the
surrounding San Mateo, Santa Clara and Contra Costa counties. Its
students reflect the diverse cultures and ethnicity of the
region. Currently, 48% of the school’s population comes from
culturally diverse backgrounds and approximately 15% of the student
body receives financial aid. The school plans to hold its present
enrollment, and to continue offering financial aid to families seeking
a high quality Catholic education who cannot otherwise afford it.
The school also hosts the parish CCD activities on weekends.
The campus
features the original main building, which includes eight classrooms
and administrative offices. There also are six portable buildings
housing the computer lab, science room, extended care facility,
resource center and Kindergarten, most of which were constructed during
the 1980s.
The
initial phase of our project will replace our existing multipurpose
hall and construct a permanent Kindergarten. The existing
Kindergarten is more than 20 years old and is at the end of its useful
life. It soon will be in violation of the city’s ordinance on
temporary structures. The existing multi-purpose facility, which
serves as a gym, meeting hall and kitchen, is seismically unsafe, is
not fully fire-protected, and does not have the square footage
necessary to host the school’s sports activities, nor school-wide
functions. Nativity’s sports program is thriving and more than
one-third of our students are active participants. However, our
school is the only Catholic elementary school on the peninsula that
does not have a gymnasium, resulting in us having to spend over $10,000
annually to rent facilities. Additionally, the hall’s capacity to
house only 120 people falls far short of accommodating the 330-strong
population (students, teachers and administrative and support
personnel) under the current fire code, leaving the school without an
enclosed facility for all-hands meetings, presentations or
ceremonies. The proposed facility is planned to accommodate
over 500 people and will fully support all school as well as parish
community activities.
These two
undertakings comprise Phase I of our project and are planned for
initiation in June 2007, at a cost of $6,960,000. These projects
represent our most pressing needs and will benefit the greatest number
in our community. The project cost of the multi-purpose pavilion
is $4.18M, the Kindergarten, $580K, and necessary site work is
projected at $2.2M.
Project Status: Thanks
to the leadership of Msgr. Steven Otellini, we have secured gifts and
pledges that represent over one half the $8 million necessary to
construct the new multi-purpose building, Kindergarten, and site
work. The $6.71 million raised to date represents a number of
large gifts from generous donors and foundations. Our goal to
support our building fund is to reach $2 million from our parents and
parishioners. The goal aided by an extremely
generous matching fund pledge from the Spieker Family Foundation.
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