Sister Carol gives a hug to Katrina victim Nigel, an 8th grader from New Orleans. Nigel attended school in Shreveport. Since then, he and his family have returned to New Orleans.
When Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans in late August 2005, many of its victims fled to shelters in Shreveport in Caddo Parish (County) in the northern part of Louisiana. Hundreds of the evacuees were young Catholic students who were suddenly not only without a home, but without a school.
Sister Carol gives a hug to Katrina victim Nigel, an 8th grader from New Orleans. Nigel attended school in Shreveport. Since then, he and his family have returned to New Orleans. |
Sister Carol Shively, an Ursuline Sister of Mount Saint Joseph and superintendent of schools for the diocese of Shreveport, sent word to the local shelters informing the hurricane victims that if a student had been in a Catholic school in the New Orleans area, that student was welcome in the Shreveport Catholic School system. The student would not have to pay for any tuition, fees or supplies, and his or her uniform would be provided. Breakfast would be served at most of the schools, lunch at all of the schools. When asked why she made such a generous offer, Sister Carol said, “It just came as an inspiration to me. I felt we had to do something. I know it’s going to be very expensive, but we’re going to do this no matter what.”
School board president Milton VanNatta remembers Sister Carol’s pledge to open the schools to the hurricane victims. He says, “When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, Shreveport saw a tremendous influx of displaced students. Sister Carol immediately started calling organizations around the country seeking aid. At the school level, she gave us one mission – take in as many students as you can and we will make it work. When I was called by the principal, my first response was, Yeh, she’s not the one paying the bills! But, after years of working with Sister Carol, I knew if anyone were to pull this off, she would get it done. So I put my faith in God and His direction of Sister Carol, and told the principal to open the doors and we would see what happened. It took more resolve than I knew I had to stand before our school council in those first few months and say I had every confidence in the world that we would be fine. Sister Carol said we would be fine. She delivered. Boy, did she deliver! Money for tuition for displaced students, book bags, supplies, everything. At times, her office looked more like Office Depot.”
Hurricane victims listen as Sister Carol tells them of the arrangements for their children in the Catholic schools in the Shreveport Diocese. |
All totaled, the Shreveport Catholic School system, under Sister Carol’s leadership, took in 850 students and educated half of them for the rest of the school year, the other half until they returned to the New Orleans area or to areas where their families relocated. Since then most of the students who completed the entire school year in Shreveport have returned to their homes in the Gulf area, but 150 of them have remained in Shreveport, they and their families becoming permanent residents of the area.
Sister Carol’s opening of her arms to the devastated victims of Katrina came as no surprise to those who know her. She has spent her entire adult life teaching and administering to Catholic children.
Sister Carol is a native of Lebanon, Kentucky, in Marion County, the older of two daughters born to John and Annette Shively. Her father was a construction worker.
Her formal schooling began at the Calvary Elementary School in Calvary, Kentucky, where Ursuline Sisters of Mount Saint Joseph taught her for six years. The Maple Mount Ursulines continued to play a role in her education. Over half the staff was filled by Ursulines at Saint Charles Junior High in Saint Mary, Kentucky, where Sister Carol attended seventh, eighth and ninth grades. There were 10 Ursulines on the faculty at Marion County High School when she attended school there. The assistant principal at Marion County High was Sister Mary Carl, also an Ursuline Sister of Mount Saint Joseph.
Sister Carol and assistant superintendent Sister Ann Middlebrooks, SEC, have been friends for 11 years. Sister Ann is an associate of the Ursuline Sisters of Mount Saint Joseph. |
Following her graduation from high school, Sister Carol was accepted at Mount Saint Joseph and in August of 1977 began her postulancy at the Mount as well as her freshman year at Brescia College.
Her first teaching assignment was teaching all subjects to fifth graders at Saint Romuald in Hardinsburg, Kentucky, where Sister Pat Rhoten was the school principal. Sister Pat is presently a teacher at the Saint John Berchmans Cathedral School in Shreveport, where Sister Carol is superintendent of schools.
After one year at Saint Romuald, Sister Carol taught all subjects to seventh and eighth graders for two years at Saint Paul School in Leitchfield and then English and religion to sixth, seventh and eighth graders at Saint Pius X in Owensboro for two years.
After only five years in the classroom, Sister Carol moved up to the administration level when she was assigned to Saint Teresa School in Glennonville, Missouri. “When I first arrived there I taught seventh and eight grade and served as principal of the school,” Sister Carol explains. “I did that for four years. Then the superintendent in the diocese asked me to consider dropping teaching to serve as principal not only of Saint Teresa in Glennonville, but also as principal of Immaculate Conception in New Madrid.” She accepted the offer and remained in that dual position for four years.
Administrative Assistant Mary Gully says, "Sister Carol has a kind and gentle spirit, which helps to foster the Christian environment that I am so grateful to be a part of." |
Once the schools became accredited, Sister Carol left Immaculate Conception but remained principal at Saint Teresa and became principal at Sacred Heart School in Poplar Bluff. She held that dual position for two years and then said goodbye to the classroom.
“Sister Mary Matthias was our congregational leader at that time and she challenged me to really look at something new,” Sister Carol recalls. “I always had a passion for marketing and development and I thought that was where the Lord was calling me. A position was available for assistant superintendent for development and marketing for Catholic schools at Beaumont, Texas. I applied for that position and went to Beaumont in 1996.”
Three months after arriving in Beaumont, the superintendent of schools there became ill and Sister Carol was named interim superintendent. The ailing superintendent never returned, and on January 15, 1997, Sister Carol was named permanent superintendent of schools, a position she held for three years.
In 1999 Bishop William B. Friend invited Sister Carol to come to Shreveport to take over the duties of superintendent of Catholic schools of Northern Louisiana, a position she still holds today.
She presides over 2,280 elementary and high school students in seven schools in northern Louisiana, five elementary schools and two high schools, Loyola College Prep in Shreveport and Saint Frederick in Monroe.
Since arriving in Shreveport, Sister Carol has worked side by side with Sister Ann Middlebrooks, SEC, the associate superintendent of schools for the Shreveport diocese. “Sister Ann has been the perpetual southern teacher to me,” says Sister of her long-time friend and associate. “The Catholic school culture is very different here in the South. The diversity of the student population is so different and she helped me with the transition from the German population of the Midwest to the southern population, with its racial diversity in the South and different attitudes of parents and, best of all, a southern hospitality that really has a kinship to the mission of the Ursuline Sisters.”
Christine Rivers, Chancellor of the Diocese of Shreveport and Sister Carol's supervisor, says, "We are blessed by her presence in north Louisiana." |
Sister Ann says of her close friend and associate, “Sister Carol and I have been friends and co-workers for over 11 years. Her love for education and expertise in the field of teaching is a great asset to all she ministers to.”
She continues, “Sister Carol is a motivator and can really inspire educators to reach for the stars. She has high expectations and professional development for educators is a priority. Staying at the top of your game is a requirement, not an option. She is a delegator and expects those whom she entrusts to get the jobs done to do them well. She is very appreciative of the work others do and communicates that. She makes it very clear that she is a resource of assistance for the school administrators. She very seldom gives up on anyone. She is willing to work with you and assist you with unlimited resources.”
Christine Rivers, Chancellor of the Diocese of Shreveport, is Sister Carol's supervisor. She says, "Sister Carol possesses the quality of being able to work in collaboration with diverse groups of people. She is committed to the growth and viability of Catholic schools in our diocese. We are blessed by her presence in north Louisiana."
School board president VanNatta, who praised Sister Carol for her efforts during the Katrina hurricane crisis, says she was the right person at the right time when she arrived in Shreveport to take over as superintendent. “When Sister Carol arrived in Shreveport, she found a system of five elementary/middle schools and one high school,” he explains. “System was only due to the fact we all belonged to the diocese. There was no contact between schools, no true systematic view of curriculum, no common accounting and reporting to the diocese, nothing. Immediately upon her arrival, that all changed. Since she began her tenure as superintendent of schools, the dialogue among schools has been opened up, curriculum has been standardized, and common reporting policies have been installed.”
He continued, “To say that I admire the job she has done in Shreveport is an understatement. I am very confident that without her guidance, there would be two fewer schools today and the remaining elementary school would not be very stable. She has brought a sense of community to all the schools, opened the lines of communication, and set standards for accountability and curriculum. I am truly blessed to have had the opportunity to work with her since she arrived in Shreveport.”
Sister Carol addresses employees at an Employee Appreciation Luncheon at the Catholic Center. |
Cathedral of Saint John Berchmans School principal Jo Cazes says of her superintendent, “The Diocese of Shreveport is a mission diocese located in the Bible Belt South where Catholics number about five percent of the population and about one person in four lives in poverty. These characteristics bring unique challenges to Sister Carol’s position, challenges that she meets with wisdom, skill and vision. Her efforts on behalf of Catholic schools have enhanced Catholic identity, strengthened curriculum and ensured school staff formation. Sister Carol possesses the quality of being able to work in collaboration with diverse groups of people. She is committed to the growth and viability of Catholic schools in our diocese. We are blessed by her presence in north Louisiana.”
What are her biggest challenges? “One of the biggest is the fact that we work in a mission diocese that doesn’t always have homegrown men as priests,” says Sister Carol. “We have a number of international priests here. The most challenging part has been wedding them to their Catholic schools, because our Catholic schools can become very much orphaned and that has been my whole context the last eight years, to shepherd them into embracing that school, embracing those children. You say this over and over and over.”
As a Catholic school administrator in the heart of the southern Bible belt, the cost of education is an ongoing challenge. “We’re tuition-based schools, not church-subsidized schools,” she explains. “Therefore we’re constantly working with our school and finance councils to try to keep the costs as low as possible, and at the same time to provide the services that are expected. We’re sitting right here around Barksdale Air Force Base where parents are coming in from all over the world. Their children have experiences and they want to put them in our schools and yet we try to give them the world on a shoestring…and that’s basically what we’re doing right now.”
Sister Carol says serving the poor is another major challenge. "I believe as Ursulines we have an absolute obligation to serve the poor," she says. "But the poor can’t be served if we hold the (same) standard for those who receive the services as we do the family that makes $200,000 a year. You keep your school open if you have big bank accounts, you keep your school open if you don’t have any money. Someday, the Catholic Church has to step in and take care of that problem. Because we are going to be judged the most harshly for not serving the poor.”
The most disappointing? Says Sister Carol, “Not being able to open schools in areas that I know need new schools, particularly in Bossier Parish. We don’t have a school over there, yet it’s the fastest growing parish (county) in the state. People are willing to just keep the status quo when I know what Catholic schools can do to help those families bring their children up as Catholics. We’re not always where our people are now. Fifty years ago we were, but we have not kept up with society.”
What has Sister Carol found most satisfying in her nine years as superintendent? She says, “When I arrived there was no protocol, there were no procedures in place whatsoever, and I had a group of principals who really had a lack of confidence in the central office. What I brought to the office was stability and a real spirit of serving them; I only exist to serve them. I think I have spoken that though my work and my examples this entire time.”
She continues, “The more rewarding part of it is that I really do know that I am able to serve them and to offer assistance in areas in all kinds of ways. And when you have a team that you can really trust, you can do almost anything, and that’s what I have here!”
