Overview

The NativityMiguel School movement began with one school over 30 years ago and continues to spread throughout the country in response to the need for such schools in urban communities.

The Network was established after an exponential growth of the NativityMiguel School model, a growth which began in 1993.  The first Nativity School opened in 1971 in the lower east side of Manhattan with the mission of providing high quality education to middle school age boys who had the potential to succeed academically, but who had no alternative to their troubled public school.  To make up for the grade level deficit the boys exhibited, the school day was lengthened and the year extended.  In addition, a graduate support system was established to follow the graduates through high school to ensure the boys kept up with the study habits and work ethic instilled while at Nativity.

The effectiveness of the model was seen in the number of alumni graduating from high school and going on to college.  Word spread among educators committed to providing children growing up in impoverished central city neighborhoods with a high quality education, an education that helps break the cycle of poverty.

Today there are 64 NativityMiguel Schools serving over 4,300 middle school age boys and girls in 27 states.  Approximately 90% of the students attending NativityMiguel Schools qualify for the Federal Government's Free and Reduced Cost Lunch program, an indication that a family is living at or near poverty.  Actually 53% of the students are African American; another 37% are Latino.

Noting that many inner-city schools have dropout rates of 50% or more, NativityMiguel model schools have succeeded where so many others fail.  Ninety-two percent (92%) of our students graduate from high school, as compared to the national rate for African-American and Latino students of 55%, and the four-year dropout rate for the network's high school graduation class this year was 6 percent, and 96 percent enrolled in a two- or four-year college this fall.

Our schools provide a safe place to learn and keep the students away from the dangerous influences on their neighborhood streets.

The NativityMiguel Network strives to increase the capacity of these schools, and future schools, to continue to provide the kind of education that will make a lasting difference in the lives of the children we are privileged to teach and counsel.