Our foundation was established in 1991, but the real story starts in 1980 and 1981 when funding woes caused three struggling schools (Visitation, St. John Basilica, and St. Peter) to merge into one, named Holy Family School. But even that dramatic change wasn't sufficient and in 1991, Holy Family School was slated to close after maintenance costs and teacher salaries could not be met through tuition and parish support. Fr. Tom Pfeffer, then pastor at Visitation Church, and some like-minded friends reached out to the larger Des Moines community for help, and the Holy Family School Inner City Foundation was formed.

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By then, All Saints and St. Ambrose had also merged their schools into Holy Family, which was then operating out of two buildings. In 1998, our foundation accepted its first major challenge -- raising $3 million to expand and remodel the Visitation building, putting all of the students under one roof, and establishing an endowment. The foundation accepted a second challenge in 2003 -- raising $2.3 million to provide an endowment to further support the operations of the school. 

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Since then, the demographics of the students have changed rapidly. But our mission has not.  We want to make sure Holy Family Catholic School is here to provide students with an exceptional, faith-based education for years to come.