Divine Providence Academy at St. Catherine's

Mission 

As a Catholic academy, we cultivate courageous servants of God by nurturing strengths and promoting leadership through academic and spiritual excellence.

Academics

One of the practices that makes Divine Providence Academy truly stand out is our focus on personalized education for our students in a multi-aged classroom. Our goal is to create a personalized curriculum for each student that focuses on what the particular child needs at any part of their education. Students “learn at their own pace and their own level.” Some of the supports that aid in this personalized education include 1:1 computers for all students in kindergarten through eighth grade, a partnership with Christian Learning Center Network (CLC) for students with disabilities, and Response to Intervention for students who can benefit from extra support.

Through this model of education, our students have shown tremendous growth and continue to score above average on standardized testing.

Faith

At Divine Providence Academy our mission is to work to cultivate courageous servants of God. Our students participate in religion class daily in addition to daily prayer in each classroom. In religion classes, students learn about the life of Jesus, the Catholic Church, and ways to be evangelizers. Students also lead the communities in daily Mass once a week. With our school having two campuses, we find ways to come together as one by having all-school Masses at either campus to celebrate key parts of the year: feast days, holy days of obligation, and at the beginning and end of each school year.

In addition, students have regular exposure to those in the religious life, the parish's priest often makes visits to the school, and one our teachers is a sister from the Franciscan Sisters of the Eucharist.

We also strive to provide our students with various service projects throughout the year. In the past we have raised money for a school in Uganda, collected food for local food pantries, served food at food trucks and made care packages for those in the military overseas. In our middle school classroom, students have had the opportunity to learn more about their faith during a Theology of the Body retreat and have attended youth conferences like Holy Fire.

Extracurriculars

At Divine Providence Academy, we strive to enrich the whole child. In addition to core academic classes, students also participate in art, music, physical education, and Spanish classes each week. Once in fourth grade, students have the opportunity to participate in band; meeting twice a week to work closely with the band instructor. These students build a strong appreciation for music, and gain responsibility from regular practice. For students that prefer to sing, we also have a schola that leads the community in song at weekly school Masses.

Divine Providence Academy also participates with GRACEAC (Grand Rapids Area Catholic Elementary Athletic Council) for sports. We even have our own team name, the Saints! There are many different sports that the kids have an opportunity to participate in, such as basketball, baseball, volleyball, tennis, track, football, and soccer.