Saint Teresa’s Academy (STA) is Kansas City’s oldest high school, founded in 1866 on Quality Hill of our fledgling downtown. The girls’ school, operated by the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Carondelet (CSJs), moved to its Windmoor Campus (55^th and Main Street) in 1909. The next year Rockhurst High School for boys and College for men were established at 52^nd and Troost Avenue by the Society of Jesus (SJs or Jesuits). A few years later, the CSJ Community added a two-year college for women at STA. In 1930 the junior college affiliated with Saint Joseph Hospital as a Nursing School and in 1940 it became a four-year institution renamed as The College of Saint Teresa. It experienced quick growth and decided, in the early 1960s, to move south to 119^th and Wornall Road. Going co-ed in 1969, it became known as Avila, changing its title from college to university in 2002. Meanwhile, Rockhurst High School separated from the men’s college in 1964, moving to the Greenlease Campus near 93^rd and State Line Road. Though both high schools remained gender-specific, Rockhurst College became co-educational the same year as Avila and switched to university status in 1999. The four educational institutions remain close to one another.

Half a century ago, there were forty or fifty Sisters of Saint Joseph and even more Jesuits living and working in Kansas City. Today there are less than ten SJs and only five or six CSJs. There is an active local Associates program for the Saint Joseph Sisters with over 100 members and a national program for the Jesuits by which lay people take vows to carry forth objectives of the respective religious orders. Though not the same, it is good that laity can gather to honor these religious groups and support the mission of service by which the Sisters, Fathers, and Brothers have impacted multiple generations of citizens and families.

Of course, there are other Catholic colleges and universities in the two dioceses that surround Kansas City. Donnelly College in Wyandotte County expanded from a two to four-year school earlier this century. Benedictine College in Atchison (a merger of Saint Benedict’s men’s school and Mount Saint Scholastica for women) and The University of Saint Mary in Leavenworth have strong prominence and lengthy tenure in northeast Kansas through the strong influence of Benedictine and Sisters of Charity communities. And Conception Seminary College in northwest Missouri has formed priests and others since the nineteenth century. In addition, various public colleges and universities in the region house Newman Centers or other ministry sites for Catholic students to gather, socialize, and pray.

As students go off to college for the first time or return to campus for the new academic year, let us keep these young adults in our prayers and also pray for the universities that welcome them and participate in their continued growth and faith development.