How ACIS Travel Physically Changed a School

Mike Rogosich serves as Dean of Culture at Cardinal Gibbons High School, a private Catholic School in North Carolina that has been in partnership with ACIS Tours for more than 30 years. He shares how international travel with ACIS has had a major impact on the school, for the students, the building itself and the school’s mission.

It was 2012. We had just completed a 40 million dollar building expansion (with no increase in tuition might I add), but one morning I received an interesting parent complaint.  The parent email detailed how the recently completed construction of our school’s entrance was inefficient.  The email even contained civil engineer charts, graphs, and aerial photography. 

I agreed with every part of the email… except the premise.  He wanted efficiency. But we weren’t engineering for efficiency; we were engineering for culture.  You see, as Catholics, we know efficiency is not a virtue.  

We had built a table top for cars to drive up to the front of the school. This area is surrounded by a beautiful brick entrance, elm trees, a Campus Green, and a glass front to our school where you can see our mission wall and our cross. The setup intentionally makes you slow down so that you have to take a minute and experience our school; it gives parents an extra moment with their child, a moment of beauty and inspiration on our campus. See, our mission is for the parents too!

But how did we as a school make the decision to change the pace and layout of such a critical part of school life?

The answer lies in the life-changing power of travel.

Building Culture Through Travel

It’s been thirty years since our first school trip to Italy.  And it began with ACIS.  We run this trip every year to St. Peter’s for Easter.  We have taken over 1000 students to Easter Mass and St. Francis’ grave in Assisi.  We now have five yearly trips with ACIS ranging from as near as England and as far as Japan — and we’re looking to add more.  We’re a school of 1600 where we’re taking 240 students this year.  All of these trips match and enhance our mission.  What started as something that we do simply because it’s right has turned out to help admissions, recruitment, retention, and fundraising. 

On our school’s annual trip to Italy, students and teachers experience Catholic art and architecture where efficiency isn’t the goal. It’s about savoring the small moments in life and being appreciative of the beauty around you. In the words of G.K. Chesterton, “The sort of man who admires Italian art while despising Italian religion is a tourist and a cad.”

Once built, our school community named this inefficient area the Piazza.  Our school’s trip to Italy is so integrated into our school that even the language, the Piazza, traveled back with us, and we recalled all of the wonderful memories strolling through the piazzas of Italy, savoring life and good company.

As Catholics, it’s in our blood to want to touch, taste, smell, see, and hear the world since it is charged with the grandeur of God. This sacramental outlook fills us with awe and wonder for the world all around us.  We are natural pilgrims.  And ACIS is a natural match with us.  Fidelity runs deep with both of us, and our 30 year relationship proves it. 

The Piazza continues to serve as a point of inspiration. It has a deep story behind it that reflects our faith and encourages curiosity about the travel program. When showcasing it for new students or potential recruits, we can tell the story of our long-standing travel history and give a real life, physical example of the impact it has had on the school. How is that for an enrollment tool?

We’re building again soon.  The Piazza might have to get changed a little bit, just like the Eternal City has been constantly constructed and reconstructed.  But there are a couple things for sure: Our school’s buildings and culture will reflect those eternal truths that we are in touch with, and that we’ll still be traveling with the company that helped us remember these truths – ACIS Educational Tours.

And so how did I respond to the original parent complaint?  I did what any administrator who is touched by Italy would do: I invited him in for a coffee and thanked him for his feedback while we walked around our beautiful piazza together.