By Sue Denny • Posted January 9, 2026

Students and staff at St. Elizabeth Catholic School in Chester Springs, Chester County enjoyed an early blue Christmas this year, but it was a far cry from the melancholy holiday in Elvis Presley’s classic song.

Instead, the Blue (Ribbon) Christmas on Dec. 10 celebrated the school’s selection as a Pennsylvania Blue Ribbon School. St. Elizabeth is the only Catholic school honored in the commonwealth’s inaugural awards program.

Until recently, the Blue Ribbon Schools Program was run annually by the U.S. Department of Education to recognize elementary and secondary schools, public and non-public, for academic performance and progress.

Following the termination of the longstanding federal program, the Pennsylvania Department of Education created its own.

“We are thrilled to have been selected as one of Pennsylvania’s Blue Ribbon Schools this year,” said St. Elizabeth principal Kate Fitzgerald. “Our students and teachers work extremely hard and are so deserving of this recognition.”

St. Elizabeth School has 24 faculty and staff who serve nearly 200 students in PreK through Grade 8.

The federal Blue Ribbon program bestowed the coveted distinction upon more than 9,700 schools during its 43-year history. In August, the Trump administration announced it was officially ending national awards “in the spirit of returning education to the states.”

The administration encouraged states to “creatively fashion” new recognition programs. In response, Pennsylvania developed a statewide initiative to continue to recognize “efforts by schools to create safe and welcoming spaces where students can master challenging and engaging content,” stated a Sept. 23, 2025 press release.

Pennsylvania is using existing federal criteria for the new state program, at least for now, according to an article in Education Week. The 13 schools that met the latest national requirements were recognized as 2025 Pennsylvania Blue Ribbon schools.

Fitzgerald admitted she was “incredibly disappointed” when the national program was discontinued. “To have that pulled away after knowing that we had achieved the honor was heartbreaking,” she said in a recent interview. “For the sake of our students and staff, I’m glad that Pennsylvania honored its schools in a special way.”

St. Elizabeth is the state’s only 2025 Exemplary High Performing School, a category for top performing schools as measured by state assessment or national normed tests.

The remaining 12 schools, including two in the Philadelphia area, were selected as Exemplary Achievement Gap Closing Schools for narrowing achievement gaps among students. The schools are Lionville Elementary in Chester County and Parkside Elementary in Delaware County.

“Pennsylvania’s schools deserve to have their hard work recognized, and that’s exactly what we’re doing,” said Acting Secretary of Education Dr. Carrie Rowe in the September press release. “While Washington may have stepped back from the Blue Ribbon program, the Shapiro administration is stepping forward to shine light on schools … .”

An awards luncheon was held Dec. 9 in Hershey in place of the traditional federal recognition ceremony in Washington, D.C. The following day, St. Elizabeth students and staff, decked out in new blue shirts, celebrated a Blue (Ribbon) Christmas in the school gymnasium.

Earlier this year, St. Elizabeth was honored as a 2025 Archdiocese School of Distinguished Instruction by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia’s Office of Catholic Education. It was one of 62 parish and regional elementary schools recognized for exceptional academic performance in two categories: growth and exceeding potential.

For more information about the 2025 Pennsylvania Blue Ribbon Schools, visit the Pennsylvania Department of Education’s website. To learn more about Catholic schools in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, visit www.aopcatholicschools.org.