St. Thomas Church in Manhattan, which has been grappling with serious financial problems in recent years, said on Friday that it would outsource the administration of its renowned boarding school for choristers in a bid to preserve the 105-year-old program.
Starting in 2025, the Professional Children’s School, an independent day school in New York, will manage St. Thomas Choir School’s academic program. St. Thomas, an Episcopal church, will continue to provide housing for the school’s 26 students, as well as offering music and religious instruction. Some of the school’s 24 faculty and staff members are expected to lose their jobs, the church’s leaders said.
The Rev. Canon Carl F. Turner, the church’s rector, said, “We’ve found a way to preserve our school in a different form through collaboration, which will not only deepen the music making but also help us make it more sustainable financially.”
St. Thomas Choir School has had financial problems for decades, balancing its budget with the help of donations and bequests, and by dipping into investment funds. Tuition, at $20,570 per year, is heavily subsidized, and many students receive scholarships.
St. Thomas’s leaders warned earlier this year that the church was considering closing the choir school, one of only a few remaining boarding schools for young choristers in the world. The church said at the time that its endowment, annual fund-raising and tuition fees were no longer sufficient to cover the roughly $4 million a year it costs to operate the school, about 30 percent of the church’s $14 million annual budget.
Under the agreement, St. Thomas will pay the Professional Children’s School for its academic services. But St. Thomas said it would save on labor costs. The church also expects that the move will free up some real estate that can be rented out.
Father Turner said the move was necessary to save the program, which steeps boys in centuries-old choral traditions more associated with English cathedral towns than Midtown Manhattan. He said that the church had not been able to raise enough funds to support the school.
“For decades, we’ve been dipping into our reserve funds in order to balance our budget,” he said. “Now is the time to do something about it.”
The move could draw criticism from parents, alumni and teachers. Some had urged the church to maintain oversight of the academic program and find other cuts instead. Others had expressed concerns that the program would lose its Christian identity if it were managed by the nonsectarian Professional Children’s School.
Church leaders tried to reassure parents, parishioners and staff members in a letter on Friday.
“Let there be no doubt: the Christian character of our school will remain as vibrant and central as ever,” Father Turner wrote in the letter.
The church said that the boys, ages 8 to 14, would continue to live in a building managed by St. Thomas and sing five services a week at the church; and that St. Thomas would continue to employ a boarding staff as well as a school chaplain.
James Dawson, head of school at the Professional Children’s School, said in a statement that the school would work to preserve St. Thomas’s traditions.
“We salute the work, the mission and the dedication that St. Thomas Choir School students carry with them,” he said. “We will work tirelessly to affirm their set of values.”
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