Msgr. Lafferty tuition grants assist hundreds of diocesan school students

By RENEE WEBB, Globe editor
Sept. 6, 2007

Checks totaling more than $565,000 were sent to Catholic schools in the Diocese of Sioux City this week.

"This is our inaugural distribution of Msgr. Lafferty Funds to individual schools on behalf of the students who qualified for scholarship tuition grants," said Kevin Vickery, superintendent of Catholic schools for the diocese. "We sent the checks to the schools and the schools will credit the accounts of students who qualified for the grants."

Another $62,500 will be distributed in early October, said Vickery. Those funds were held back so that new families to Catholic schools or current families that have experienced a change in financial status could apply or reapply for funds.

The diocesan superintendent estimated that about 100 families that are new to diocesan Catholic schools received Msgr. Lafferty grants.

"We are grateful that these dollars are helping families see that Catholic schools are within their range of choices for their children," said Vickery.

In all, about $630,000 will be distributed from the Msgr. Lafferty funds that were raised by the end of 2006.

"All schools in the diocese have students who will benefit from these funds," said Vickery.

Tom Betz, director of admissions and alumni at Bishop Heelan Catholic Schools in Sioux City, said the Msgr. Lafferty tuition grants helped both with retention and new family recruitment.

"We were able to retain the most students we have in a number of years - probably the No. 1 reason is that we were able to help more families with Msgr. Lafferty money and the money we were able to give them was larger. We were able to meet more of their needs than we have in the past," he said.

Another plus of the Msgr. Lafferty dollars, he noted, was that it freed up other tuition assistance money for other families as well.

"With increased funds available next year, we are hoping to help more and more families," said Betz.

These tuition funds were made available thanks to the historic Educational Opportunities Act that was signed into law in the summer of 2006. This act allowed persons who contributed to scholarship tuition organizations (STOs) to receive a 65 percent state tax credit as long as they had a state tax liability.

In the Diocese of Sioux City, the scholarship tuition organization was named the Msgr. Lafferty Tuition Foundation.

"The response from our benefactors was very generous," said Vickery. "We had almost 600 donors and our gifts ranged from very small to very large but the majority of our gifts were from average families who saw an extraordinary opportunity to impact our schools."

Vickery said that 3,000 students applied for assistance and about 1,700 students received grants for this school year from the Msgr. Lafferty Tuition Foundation. The funds were awarded to students with the greatest financial need.

In its first year, STOs in the state were allowed to raise $2.5 million with the diocesan share set at $690,000. This year the diocesan STO is allowed to raise and give tax credits on $1.3 million and that means about double the tuition grants will be available for the 2008-2009 school year.

While fundraising efforts haven't officially begun, already about 9 percent of the goal has been raised. The drive will kick off in October and it will conclude at the end of the year.

"We encourage people to talk to their tax advisors to find what kind of benefits this tax credit would have against their Iowa tax liability," said Vickery.