Growing up in urban Los Angeles, Michele Riolo said attending St. Malachy Catholic School from first to eighth grade in the late 1950s and early 1960s made a difference in her life.

When she later had to transfer to public school, she quickly found herself far ahead of her public-school counterparts.

"I am a product of Catholic education, and I feel blessed every day because of that," said Riolo, now a parishioner of Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Germantown, Tenn., in the Diocese of Memphis.

As she held a sheet of paper with tips from the National Black Catholic Congress's education commission on how to support Catholic schools, Riolo said she appreciates such concrete ways to support Catholic education.

The list included tithing, sponsoring a student's tuition, urging black businesses to support Catholic schools, volunteering time to a Catholic school, evangelizing to the non-Catholic community about the benefits of a Catholic education and praying for black Catholic schools. Riolo said the suggestions have inspired her to give back.

"There are things on here I can do," Riolo said about the list. "I can mentor. I can tutor."

Part of the education commission's plan to help strengthen black Catholic schools is to call on alumni such as Riolo to support schools that serve black, urban and minority populations.

Another part of the plan is to put together a fund to ensure that Catholic schools that serve black children remain financially solvent. Members of the commission called on the black Catholic community and the nation as a whole to contribute to the fund, called the National Support Initiative, to help prevent more urban and predominantly black Catholic schools from closing.

Commission member Kathleen Merritt, director of the Office of Ethnic Ministries for the Diocese of Charleston, S.C., said closing black Catholic schools can have wide-ranging consequences. In the Diocese of Charleston, for example, school closings hurt evangelization efforts and resulted in the number of black parishioners dropping from 9,000 to about 3,000, she said.

The commission hopes by 2010 to have mobilized people nationwide to help urban Catholic schools become financially stable; promote models of sustainable Catholic schools; ensure teachers, staff, administrators and students are academically competent and socially responsive; and ensure that schools are supported by parents, parishes and communities.

"We do need the community," said Dominican Sister Jamie Phelps, director of the Institute for Black Catholic Studies and professor of systematic theology at Xavier University of New Orleans. "We need to join the community. We need to put into the pot our skills, our talents and our intelligence and to be responsible to others to reverse the tide."

According to the commission's research, parish subsidies of Catholic schools have dropped, and schools also are facing staffing challenges.

The commission surveyed dioceses around the country to find examples of successful black Catholic schools that other schools could follow. The commission's findings --- including several examples of model schools --- are compiled in the book "Sustaining Catholic Education in and for the Black Community," which is available through the National Black Catholic Congress.

The models of successful schools include the diocesan-supported Jubilee Schools in Memphis --- 10 schools that have been opened or reopened since 1999 to serve Memphis' poorest areas. The schools were reopened through the support of the entire community and the vision of Bishop J. Terry Steib, said Mary McDonald, superintendent of schools for the Diocese of Memphis.

The project was supported through a trust fund that was begun with $15 million from anonymous donors. Since then the project has received additional financial support from local foundations, corporations and individuals.

"Ninety-eight percent of those who have donated millions and millions of dollars are not Catholic," McDonald said. "The only thing they know is that Catholic education works."

Money is not the only thing needed for successful Catholic schools, noted Brother Gary Sawyer, a member of the Emmaus Community of St. Augustine. A longtime teacher who works at Loyola Catholic Grade School in the Denver Archdiocese, he said schools also must partner with parents to succeed.

"Parent involvement is at the top of the list of aspects that make schools successful," Brother Sawyer said. "We are not just working with children --- educating children. We also have a population of parents that we need to educate."

Commission member Veronica Morgan-Lee urged Catholic educators to embrace bold changes to ensure the survival of schools and to volunteer and financially support their local Catholic school. She is the CEO of the Village, a family consulting firm, and executive director of the Crossroads Foundation, which provides Catholic high-school tuition scholarships and other services.

She also urged Catholics throughout the country to contribute to the National Support Initiative. If all black Catholics supported this initiative with a small donation each year, millions could be raised, she said.

"We can't sell to others what we won't buy," Morgan-Lee said.

---CNS Editor's Note: More information about the National Support Initiative is available by contacting the National Black Catholic Congress: nbcc@nbccongress.org, or (410) 547-8496.