Public Schools Get Parochial Rejects, New York Paper Says.

Although Roman Catholic schools are free to expel or deny admission to students at will, leaders in the parochial school system often say this prerogative is rarely exercised and insist they stand ready to serve all children.

But a survey by a newspaper in Staten Island, N.Y., casts doubt on those assertions. The Staten Island Advance contacted local parochial and public schools and found out that problem students are frequently kicked out of private religious schools and end up back in public institutions.

The paper found Staten Island private schools expelled more than 500 students since last September, most of them from Catholic schools. The number represents 10 percent of the entire Catholic school population on the island.

Public school officials said transfers underscore the inherent difference between private and public schools: The former are not obligated to educate all students who come to the door. "[Private schools] don't keep their problems," said Michael Marotta, principal of Tottenville High School. "They give them to the public schools and let them deal with it."

Curtis High School Principal Edward Seto agreed, telling the newspaper, "I think we need to be honest about the differences between the two systems. Were it not for the public schools, a lot of these kids would fall by the wayside."

Many parents of expelled children are angry. "My son's not an angel," said Susan Piller of Brooklyn, whose son, Jesse, was kicked out of Monsignor Farrell High School. "But he does have legal rights. We spent all this money and everything, and they won't let him take his finals and finish out the semester."

Another anonymous parent told the paper, "It was my impression that they wanted to push my son off to somebody else, to make him somebody else's problem."

Officials at Catholic schools tried to downplay the expulsions. Monsignor Joseph Ansaldi, principal of St. Joseph-by-the-Sea High School in Annadale, said when students fall behind academically, private schools are doing them a favor by asking them to move on.

"Those who are in over their heads with our college prep program are asked to make a change at the end of the first semester," Ansaldi said. "They don't have to leave. It's up to the parents. The academic dean tries to explain why this would be a good educational decision. Most accept it."

Meanwhile, a new study suggests that parochial schools are increasingly serving an affluent population.

From 1972 to 1992, the portion of Catholic high school students whose family incomes were in the top fourth of all Americans rose from 30 percent to 46 percent, observed Cornelius Riordan, a sociology professor at Providence College in Rhode Island.

Riordan said Catholic schools are "getting dangerously close to where if you go another 10 years, the majority of students in the schools will be upper-middle-class kids," reported Education Week.

Annual tuition at a Catholic elementary school averages about $1,300 and about $3,100 at a Catholic high school, according to the National Catholic Educational Association.