Holy Rosary School officials and organizers of the school’s annual gala fundraiser think this might have been their biggest year ever.

The final tally isn’t done for the income and expenses from the school’s largest annual fundraiser, but officials expect they’ll come out ahead of last year’s $70,000 fundraising profit. 

Gala co-chair Sonia McNeely said the gala’s dinner and auction help pay to educate a growing number of students at the Catholic school in Warrenton, but also fund expansion of the school’s education space.

Over the past few years, McNeely said tens-of-thousands in donations from gala attendees has helped pay for renovations to expand class space in the school building.

“This is the largest fundraiser for Holy Rosary School. It allows us to provide the lowest tuition to our families in the St. Louis Archdiocese,” McNeely said. “We added a new classroom last year. ... We’re all about maximizing and reinventing our space in the school, because our numbers have been increasing.”

This year, McNeely said about $15,000 will go toward turning underused hall space into a dedicated bathroom for the school’s preschool room. The preschool itself is also a recent addition within the building.

Principal Lori Racine said the gala and other fundraisers are critical to providing a successful school for the pre-K through eighth-grade students at Holy Rosary.

“This school year is the first time in 15 years that we’ve had no combined classrooms,” Racine said. “To provide each classroom with its own space, we had to remodel part of the building.”

Racine said Holy Rosary’s student population has grown by 48 percent in the last six years. Granted, the school is small, starting that period with 82 students and growing to 160 this year. But that growth has outpaced the surrounding community and is unusual for how rapid it’s been, Racine said.

With that growth, Racine said she and the rest of the school staff are deeply grateful for the community support that also seems to grow each year.

“It is humbling ... to be a witness to that kind of love and support and commitment to a community. It’s nothing I had ever experienced before,” Racine said.

It’s difficult to say if the trend of enrollment will continue in future years. But the school building still has more space to expand into, and Racine said with the community’s support, that will continue to be possible.