Thanks to the determination of several local residents and businessmen, Regina Academy at Saint John the Baptist in Ottsville managed to avoid the fate of the many Catholic schools that had to close for good in the last several years and is now once again thriving, writes Veronica Nygaard for the Crisis Magazine.

Brian Middleton realized his daughter’s parochial school was failing about a decade ago, and knew right away he wanted to do something about it.  So the business consultant joined forces with two other local businessmen and they took on all of the expenses at the school.

It was “about $750,000,” said Middleton.

However, despite making some progress, they learned at the start of 2012 that the Archdiocese of Philadelphia was planning on closing the school. To prevent this they began taking legal steps to become independent and joined the fold of the Regina Academies in 2014.

At the time, the school had 72 students. Today it has 130.

Read more about Regina Academy at Saint John the Baptist in the Crisis Magazine.