About Us
The schools in the CUES School System– Sacred Heart, All Saints, and Holy Name – anchor their east Omaha neighborhoods and provide a safe place for students to learn academic, social, and interpersonal skills. Many CUES families face difficult financial circumstances and simply cannot afford to pay the full tuition. They choose our Schools to give their children a quality, faith-based education. CUES students thrive in a culture of love, kindness, and excellence.
What makes us unique?
CUES Schools serve nearly 600 students. Class sizes are small. Relationships are long-standing and consistent. From pre-K through 8th grade, students, their parents, and families are part of the school community, and their life stories are known to CUES teachers and staff. We provide wrap-around support to the entire family, connecting them to outstanding community partners like Boys Town, Completely Kids, and Hope Center for Kids, to create a school-wide culture of support
All of our families receive financial assistance. No child is turned away because of their family’s inability to pay
CUES proves time and again that investing early in the lives of our children pays dividends for all of us. In 2022, 96% of CUES alumni graduated from high school, compared to approximately 74% for Omaha Public Schools.
Mission
The CUES School System is a bold educational initiative providing centralized leadership and governance to three urban elementary schools in Omaha, NE serving a majority of low-income students and families.
We combine innovative instructional methods with comprehensive student and family support in a Catholic faith-based environment to create and sustain excellent and measurable outcomes that not only impact the students we serve but also the entire community.
CUES School System admits students of any race, color, national and ethnic origin to all the rights, privileges, programs, and activities generally accorded or made available to students at the school. It does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national and ethnic origin in the administration of its educational policies, admissions policies, scholarship and loan programs, and athletic and other school-administered programs.
Learn more about CUES Schools
CUES History
CUES was formed in 1975 as a reaction to changes in the Sacred Heart School neighborhood. As more and more Sacred Heart parishioners left their North Omaha neighborhood, the parish could no longer provide significant financial support to the school. Community business leaders came together and formed CUES, a separate 501c3, to solicit support from corporations and foundations to assist Sacred Heart School.
In 2012, the CUES Board addressed a community need once again, and responded to support other east Omaha schools facing closure, adding All Saints and Holy Name Schools to the CUES funding mission.
For many Catholic schools, the older parish school model of governance is no longer effective. In 2018, to become sustainable and to provide the best academic outcomes for CUES students, the CUES Board of Directors created a new, separate governing organization, the CUES School System.
The CUES Board of Directors was determined that CUES would take a more proactive approach to serving its mission and become two distinct organizations. There is now the CUES School System, a religious 501c3, responsible for governing the 3 schools, and the CUES Fund, a non-religious 501c3, whose sole purpose is to fully fund the school system. These changes were made with the full support of the Archdiocese.
CUES is now among the most unique education models in the country with one “arm” responsible for governing and the other responsible for funding. Both arms are accountable to separate and distinct boards, and each board is comprised of professionals with talents specifically related to either governing or funding.
CUES Today
By establishing new school governance, and by separating the fundraising efforts from school management duties, the CUES organization as a whole now has more accountability and greater efficiency, particularly with respect to financial management. New governance for CUES schools allows CUES to maximize the talents of various lay people by placing them in positions of authority. The CUES Fund is essentially a development office but now staffed more appropriately for funding its own operations and the operations of the CUES School System.
CUES Fund
The CUES Fund secures financial support through private donations to fully fund the CUES School System. The school system provides centralized leadership and governance to three urban grade schools: Sacred Heart, All Saints and Holy Name. The CUES Fund is a non-religious, non-profit organization overseen by a Board of Directors.