Cristo Rey Baton Rouge Franciscan High School celebrated the return to its north Baton Rouge campus today, nearly a year-and-a-half after flood waters engulfed the school in August 2016, upending students, faculty and staff.
Students, teachers and staff at the school cut the ribbon on the reconstructed campus at 4000 St. Gerard Ave. at a ceremony attended by Mayor Sharon Weston Broome and Bishop Robert Muench.
“Many of our corporate partners were there,” President Brian Moscona says. “We’re very grateful to have so many in attendance.”
And though the school celebrated the reopening of its campus, students will not begin classes there until Wednesday. Cristo Rey’s new modular campus spans 36,000 square feet and is configured into seven buildings, Moscona says. The buildings house offices, classroom and cafeteria space and enough room to accommodate as many as 400 students.
Currently, Cristo Rey has 113 students in ninth and tenth grades, Moscona says. Cristo Rey will continue to add students over the next two years until it has about 400-500 student in grades 9-12.
Cristo Rey is a Chicago-based network of Catholic college preparatory schools that caters to low-income students. The school’s has a unique education model in which it partners with local businesses for a corporate work study program in which Baton Rouge-area businesses employ Cristo Rey students in white collar jobs.
After it was displaced by the flood, Cristo Rey held classes in the Bon Carre Business Center, which students spent time cleaning before heading to their school.
