December 17, 2017

Dear Friends in Christ,

As part of the mission of our Church, we are called to educate our children in our beautiful Catholic faith.  To do this, it takes all of us; those who have small children, grown children, grandchildren and those who don’t have any children.  We are all responsible for their Catholic Education.  

We know giving a child a Catholic Education at a Catholic School is a sacrifice for families and our church communities.  Now there is a new and exciting opportunity we have here in the State of Illinois.

Earlier this fall, the State of Illinois passed the Invest in Kids Act.  This legislation outlined the state’s program to fund public schools, but it also created the tax scholarship program.  The tax scholarship program is designed to give all families, regardless of income, access to choices in education…including Catholic Schools. 

The new law has allowed for private, non-profit organizations to accept donations and give out private school scholarships to students in grades K-12 based on income.  Our Diocese has chosen to partner with Empower Illinois and all correspondences will go through them.

Scholarships of 50, 75 or 100% of tuition and necessary fees based on income will be available to students.    A chart with qualifying incomes is available in today’s bulletin.  If you or someone you know would qualify, please encourage them to apply!

However, for the scholarships to be available to needy students, we also need your help.  This is not a state funded program.  The program will be funded completely by donations.  Donations can be made on the corporate level or as an individual.  No amount is too small! 

As an incentive, the State has agreed to give a 75% tax credit for the amount of the donation up to $1 million dollars.  For example:  A person donates $1000 to the program.  In return they receive a $750 tax credit on their State income taxes.  So their $1000 donation really cost them $250. 

Individuals can direct their donation to a specific school or subset of school.  If you decided to donate, we ask that you specify St. Mary Elementary and Jr. High.  This way we can help the families right here in our community give their children the blessing of a Catholic Education in a Catholic School.

DONATIONS:  In order to donate there are some steps that have to be taken ahead of time, so please review this information at the Empower Illinois website, www.empowerillinois.org.

The applications for students are expected to begin January 24, 2018. 

Now obviously this is the simple explanation of the new tax scholarship program.  If you would like to know more information or have specific questions, please contact Beth Heitkamp at the Rockford Diocese 815.399.4300, Jean Spohn at St. Mary’s 815.284.6986 or Caroline Toppert, Business Manager/St. Mary’s 815.284.7719

Yours in Christ,

Fr. Keith Romke