Leadernews for the TRINITY HIGH SCHOOL FAMILY
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The SUMMER 2014 LeaderNEWS FOR THE TRINITY HIGH SCHOOL FAMILY Class of www.trinityrocks.com 2014 Excels see page 24 John King ’80, left, and Larry Link ’72 Jina and Scott ’77 Scinta Photos by Anna Dawson H’14 Anna Tatman, left, and John ’83 and Johnna Cristofoli Front row: Trish Riddle H’11, left, Susan Barnes and Dave ’75, left, and Cindy Aberli and Mike Jones ’74 Cindy Messmer Back row: Millicent Meehan H’13 and Holly Bloomfield The LeaderNEWS FOR THE TRINITY HIGH SCHOOL FAMILY ISSUE SUMMER 2014 ON THE COVER: Graduation 2014 PHOTOS BY GAIL KAMENISH H’05 OFFICE FOR SCHOOL ADVANCEMENT VICE PRESIDENT FOR Joey Porter ’78 SCHOOL ADVANCEMENT ADMISSIONS Chris Toth ’06 ADMISSIONS James Torra H’12 ALUMNI RELATIONS Travis Wagoner ’90 / COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT Melanie Hughes / ALUMNI RELATIONS ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT Marie Diehl / ADMISSIONS MAGAZINE DESIGN Larry Jackson PRINTER Preferred Printing DIRECTOR / MAJOR GIFTS Tim Culver ’82 The Leader is published four times a year for Trinity High School alumni, students, parents and friends by Trinity High School, Office for School Advancement, 4011 Shelbyville Road, Louisville, KY 40207. Postage paid at Louisville, KY. POSTMASTER: Send address corrections to: Trinity High School, Office for School Advancement, 4011 Shelbyville Road, Louisville, KY 40207. Phone: (502) 893-7625. Fax: (502) 899-2052 Trinity is a Catholic college NOTICE OF NONDISCRIMINATION POLICY Trinity High School admits students of any race, color, national and prepatory high school, forming ethnic origin to all the rights, priviliges, programs and activities generally available to students. Trinity does not discriminate on the basis of men of faith and men of character. race, color, national or ethnic origin, or disability (if with reasonable accommodation the student can meet the requirements of Trinity’s course of study) in the administration of its educational policies, scholarship or loan programs, athletic or other school-administered programs. leadermagazine FOR ALUMNI AND FAMILY OF TRINITY HIGH SCHOOL WE HAVE NEVER BEEN HESITANT to admit that we can be better. After all, we are a school; we are in the improvement business. As evidence of this, look at the changes we bring about on a regular basis to improve the opportunities we place before our students. They keep coming. A new daily class schedule. Grades online. Our RockSpace online curriculum. Doubling the number of college guidance counselors. Eight science labs. Nine computer labs. “Bring-Your-Own-Device” technology approach. Nine new interscholastic sports in the past dozen years. A new food service provider. Study-abroad programs. Updated mission statement. And more. We inherited this innovative mindset from our founding pioneers. They started with little, made do with what they had and kept plowing ahead. (Monsignor Steinhauser stocked the first kitchen with Army surplus pots and pans.) It is that mindset that has propelled us to being considered one of the community’s premier schools. In the last 30 years, one of the key tools we have used in our constant innovation has been the research conducted by a firm first called Southern Research, which is now known BY DR. ROBERT (ROB) J. MULLEN ‘77, PRESIDENT as Horizon Insight. Founded by Paul Schulte H’92 and a partner, Horizon has been extremely helpful in providing president’s notebook president’s data we use to make decisions. Schulte’s son Matt ’95 now works with Paul. Like his father before him, Matt currently “Asking others to grade your work can be serves on the Trinity School Board. Paul has been inducted into our Hall of Fame. unsettling. We might tell ourselves we are The most recent research project Horizon conducted for us was an extensive survey of our alumni. Many readers doing a good job, but until others chime in, of this column participated in this effort, either in a face- you can never be sure.” to-face discussion, a phone interview or by responding to an Internet survey. We were aiming to (a) learn alumni perspectives about their Trinity experience; (b) gather • The most common reasons given for having impressions about the school today; (c) identify levels of this positive impression are (a) the academic satisfaction and engagement with our outreach to alumni; experience; (b) faculty and staff members; (c) and (d) understand motivations for and barriers to making the school’s caring atmosphere/environment; financial gifts to the school. (d) making lifelong friendships; and (e) the Let me share information about the research and insights school helped set a foundation for a successful we gained: life. • We attracted a large response to our invitation to • Graduates from the last two decades (1990- participate. In fact, it is the largest number of alumni we 2013) report the highest levels of positive have ever had participate in a research project. The high impressions, although those graduating from level of participation gives us confidence that the results 1957-89 still rank their experience extremely are representative of all alumni. favorably. • The project was a joint effort by the Trinity High School • Something very interesting was revealed in this Alumni Board of Directors and the Trinity High School study. Regardless whether respondents were Foundation. Both bodies work together to further the a recent donor, an occasional donor or one mission and vitality of the school. who has never donated to the school, positive impressions about their Trinity experience • Alumni, stretching as far back as our earliest days, remained consistent. reflect on their time as Trinity students with affection and satisfaction. In fact, 97 percent report a positive • Alumni, from our first decade of graduates impression. all the way to the most recent, report positive impressions about the school’s operation and performance today (95 percent). 4 FOR ALUMNI AND FAMILY OF TRINITY HIGH SCHOOL leadermagazine • Reasons for this nearly unanimous impression were • Not too far behind are those who follow the school found to be due to (a) state of the students’ and through the Internet, be it our website, emails from school’s academic performance; (b) the school’s the school, Facebook or Twitter. A large segment of positive reputation; (c) the school’s ability to provide our alumni report receiving regular communications a student with a foundation for a successful life; (d) from their class ambassador. the traditions and pride evident among the school community toward the school; and (e) the present- What we learned is affirming, encouraging and day atmosphere and environment. instructive. Affirming • Again, graduates from the last two decades record Asking others to grade your work can be unsettling. the highest degree of satisfaction with the school’s We might tell ourselves we are doing a good job, but until current status; but even alumni from our first 40 others chime in, you can never be sure. years are nearly identical in their high level of This study gives us many reasons to be proud. admiration for the school today. Our alumni look back and not only appreciate their experience while they were here but also support our • Alumni report their involvement with their alma present-day efforts and results. It would have been mater is dominated by attending athletic and devastating to learn that feelings about the school are alumni events, with school events like concerts and lukewarm. But in reality, the amount of support we art shows also being mentioned. Not surprisingly, receive from alumni already told us before we started there were high degrees of satisfaction with the this project that what we are doing is on track. Still, it events alumni attend – even among alumni who are was nice to hear it. infrequent donors to the school. Encouraging • By far, the top three reasons why alumni donate Alumni cite the number-one reason for donating to money to the school are (a) to assist more young the school is to open the doors for others to attend. This men to have access to the same experiences they had gives our fundraising efforts a “seal of approval” since as a student; (b) to acknowledge that some of the money we raise from donors goes to create more access success an alumnus has today is due to their Trinity to the school for students who otherwise could not afford experience; and (c) donating to the school is the best it. The donor’s wishes and our use of the gift are aligned. way to show appreciation for their experience as a This is encouraging. student. It is also encouraging to learn that a reason alumni do not donate to the school is because they think • It was interesting to learn that the number-one their gift won’t be significant enough. It is not due to reason why an alumnus does not support the dissatisfaction with the school “back then” or now. It school financially is this: “I don’t have the financial is not because of dissatisfaction with our mission. It resources to donate money to Trinity.” Closely tied to pointedly tells us we need to do a better job explaining this reason is: “I don’t feel like I could make a large that every gift is significant. We will do so. enough contribution to make a real difference.” Instructive • It was great to learn our award-winning quarterly Our task now is to translate this learning into action. newsmagazine, The Leader, is widely read. In Our three boards – Alumni, School and Foundation – are fact, more than eight out of every 10 alumni recall united in working to turn these data into action. Work receiving it. The percentage of alumni who then go is already underway to do so. Improved communication on and report reading it thoroughly is high as well.