In Going, Going, Gone: The Dynamics of Disaffiliation in Young Catholics, the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate identified a disturbing statistic: the median age of disaffiliation for young Catholics is 13 years old, with 74 percent of the sample saying they lost their faith between the ages of 10 and 20.[1] Clearly, the stakes are high for the religious education and formation of our young Catholics, and it is clear to me that the way that we approach Catholic education in our schools is contributing to this trend.

I have spent the past four years as a diocesan-level administrator for the Archdiocese of St. Louis. We approach all subjects with the conviction that all students can learn at a high level. In order to make this lofty goal a reality, we borrow from Rick Dufour’s formula of four questions: (1) What is it that we want students to know and be able to do? (2) How will we know when each student has learned it? (3) How will we respond when some students don’t learn it? (4) How will we extend the learning for some students who have demonstrated proficiency?[2] This approach has proven its value in traditional school subjects, and I believe it can have a powerful effect in faith education. Let’s briefly consider how we can approach each of these.

Question 1: With Respect to Their Life of Catholic faith, What Is It That We Want Students to Know and Be Able to Do?

My guess is that most schools, systems of schools sponsored by orders, and entire (Arch)dioceses have not yet answered this question. In Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, one of Stephen Covey’s recommended habits is to begin with the end in mind.[3] As basic as this sounds, I have observed that many teachers do not take this approach. In most of these cases, it is because these teachers have allowed textbooks to drive education in their classrooms: The plan for success is to start at page one of the textbook and get as far as circumstances allow. Over the years, I have lost count of how many times I have heard a comment along the lines of “I got further in my book than I ever have before” or “with this class, I probably won’t make it very far this year.” While there are, of course, counterexamples, often religion teachers—many who may mean well but who are not necessarily well versed in the faith—take this same approach of flipping pages and doing class reads of the textbook until time runs out in the school year.

What is needed are clear priorities from the top all the way down for guiding the decisions of what students should know and do when it comes to the area of religion. If we don’t begin with the end in mind when it comes to faith outcomes, we certainly won’t achieve them. In our Archdiocese, a committee including personnel from the offices of the archbishop and auxiliary bishop, the Office of Catholic Education and Formation, the seminary, the curia of the Archdiocese of St. Louis, and others drafted a unified framework of religion standards. The introduction to the framework reads:

The Archdiocesan Religion Standards PreK–8 represent the introduction and progression of the Catholic faith at age-appropriate levels. The standards contain content, beliefs, and practices to guide educators in forming students in the faith. It is built upon the foundations of the four pillars of the Catechism of the Catholic Church represented by the domains: We Believe, We Worship, We Live, and We Pray. The strands represent beliefs and practices to support and clarify each domain. The ultimate goal of the standards is to form students as witnesses of our faith through sharing the story of Christ and His gospel.[4]

While there have been many conversations about the Depth of Knowledge (DOK) or verb choice of certain standards and changes that will likely happen over time, our Archdiocese has begun our most important task, the faith development of our young Catholics, with the end in mind. As anyone who has been involved in curriculum writing knows, standards like these are just the beginning. More work is needed to have students actually achieve these goals in the classroom.[5] The involvement of the practitioners is essential because the closer the designer is to the students, the more likely the plan becomes reality instead of a theoretical exercise.[6]

Because each school and situation is different, the framework leaves space for teacher individualization of the guiding standards for school charism and for different cultural celebrations within the Catholic tradition. A city parish school with a primarily Latino population in St. Louis City, for example, has many different but equally beautiful religious celebrations and traditions than a St. Louis County parish school staffed for years by Irish religious sisters.

This combination of clear guidance from the Church with school-level leaders and practitioners making the theoretical into something operational can deliver transformational experiences for our young Catholics.