St. Joseph's Preparatory School

St. Joseph's Preparatory School...St. Joe's Prep... "The Prep." Go anywhere in the Delaware Valley and say those words and people will know. They will know the excellence produced here since 1851. They will know that a graduate of St. Joseph's Prep is more than just a scholar. Preppers are leaders in business, in education, in law, in politics. They are "men for and with others" who serve their families, their churches, their communities.

We know that when it comes to selecting a high school for your son, you can pick a school, or, you can choose an education. At the Prep, students actually get TWO educations—one in the classroom, and one from the world around them—and both create bright, passionate and well-spoken young men, prepared to live life to the fullest and take on college and the world!

We're proud of our Jesuit heritage, as well as our downtown location and its front-and-center access to all the culturally-rich "classrooms" a thriving city like Philadelphia has to offer--museums, famed sports facilities (like the Palaestra at Penn), the Schuylkill River, and more arts and entertainment than you can shake an orchestra baton at.

With a "campus" like this, it's no wonder our students come out with a well-rounded perspective, a transformed sense of humility and justice, and an ever-open eye toward their city, their fellow citizens...and an entire world of possibilities ahead of them.

St. Joseph's Prep is one of approximately 50 Jesuit secondary schools in the United States and each one challenges its students to go beyond academic excellence, to be reflective, to be committed to the service of faith and the promotion of justice: to be "men for and with others."

Throughout their years at the Prep, our students grow and evolve in so many areas beyond their academic pursuits. The Profile of the Graduate at Graduation, a document written by the Jesuit Secondary Education Association, offers each student an opportunity to become aware of who they are becoming while in high school, and why. Our goal here at the Prep is to graduate young men marked by the following characteristics: open to growth, intellectually competent, religious, loving, and committed to doing justice.

Over the last two thousand years, a community of believers have struggled to lead lives modeled on the teachings of their Redeemer Jesus Christ and to spread the “good news” implicit in the New Testament accounts of His life. For almost five hundred years the Society of Jesus--"the Jesuits"--founded by St. Ignatius of Loyola, has worked in that tradition of the Roman Catholic Church to bring to each new generation an appreciation of the importance of these Christian values in helping all to lead rich and meaningful lives. Founded in 1851 as a Jesuit secondary school for young men, St. Joseph’s Preparatory School today strives to interpret the Ignatian charism for all of its students, stressing in particular that each one of them is an individual redeemed with a perfectible nature and, further, that all other human beings are similarly blessed and gifted.

This invitation requires a habit of reflection and resolve that is modeled on the “Spiritual Exercises” of Ignatius and designed to promote the growth of a person who is striving to become more spiritual and loving, more intellectual and open, and, finally, ever more committed to promoting faith and justice.

To promote this growth, the school embraces the Ignatian emphasis on a spirit of cura personalis which affirms the value and dignity of every individual and trusts that students will prosper in an environment where they are nurtured and encouraged to make choices that are a manifestation of their most noble and generous instincts, the signs of the spirit of their Redeemer working within them.

All of our faculty members incorporate the Ignatian tradition and teachings of the Catholic faith into their instruction. Each of our faculty members play a critical and unique role in creating and sustaining our Ignatian tradition. Our faculty shares in our goal of rooting our students in a personal relationship with Christ and basic Christian values. Additionally, and in true Jesuit form, at the center of the Prep's academic philosophy is the Ignatian tradition of educating the mind and the heart. Meaning, at our institution, no student should reach the end of his day feeling either unchallenged or unloved.