Two anonymous donors have gifted $1.5 million to create an endowment for Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Milwaukee.
Cristo Rey Jesuit High School, which opened in 2015, announced the endowment at its 10-year anniversary event on May 7. The milestone marked a time for celebration, but also for future planning, said Andrew Stith, president of Cristo Rey Jesuit High School.
“We know we have to think to the future, not just the next 10 years, but the next 25 or 50 years,” Stith told BizTimes. “In looking to secure the future, we started talking with some donors about starting an endowment. We feel really grateful to those donors for stepping up, seeing that the school is in a position, after 10 years, to begin an endowment and really help us to plan to fund priority areas in the future.”
The endowment will have two priority areas. It will provide future scholarships so that Cristo Rey and its opportunities can be accessible, as well as funding for teacher and staff retention efforts, Stith said. Cristo Rey, which will have a 90% teacher retention rate at the end of the school year, aims to remain competitive for talent in the future.
“We know that that our staff are the connection that our students have to our schools and living embodiment of our mission to our community and our students,” Stith said. “We want to do everything we can to ensure that they feel both appreciated and valued for the great work that they do here.”
Stith said the donors felt it was important to kick off the endowment this year because “they saw the school come to a point where we could begin thinking longer term and thinking about those priority areas.”
“They believe in our faculty, and they believe in attracting great students who want this type of education,” Stith said.
At its 10-year anniversary event, Cristo Rey also named four inaugural recipients of its Trailblazer Awards. The individuals were recognized for their roles as co-chairs of the feasibility study that led to the school’s opening. The award recipients included:
- Jim Flaherty, retreat director at Jesuit Retreat Center in Oshkosh
- William Henk, dean emeritus at the College of Education at Marquette University
- Jeff Snell, president and CEO of Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee
- Anne Zizzo, founder and CEO of Zizzo Group Engagement Marketing & Zizzo Ventures Real Estate
