There are plenty of private schools with average programs or worse.
1. Toledo St. Francis won D2 in 2002, I think, but hasnt been consistantly good in many years.
2. Toledo St. Johns has always been decent, but not great.
3. Oregon Cardinal Stritch couldnt even field a team this year.
4. The Columbus privates have had a little success with Hartley
5. But not much else with St. Francis, Watterson, and Ready. There are a lot of others that arent good, barely get by, or have seen better days.
6. Delphos St. John isnt good anymore. 7. Tiffin Calvert, Fremont St. Joes, and Sandusky St. Marys dont have strong programs.
8. Norwalk St. Paul has a good program however.
9. In Cleveland, Benedictine was 0-10 this year. Holy Name was pretty decent. But NDCL and others didnt dominate.
My point is success begets success. Good programs attract good players. Some programs rise. Some fall. Painting the Catholic schools with a broad brush is not the way to go.
Catholic schools have an advantage in that they can take.kids from anywhere. Some public schools do this as well.
Many suburban public schools have advantages too. The per capita income in some of them dwarfs other public schools. Families with 2 parents at home making good money spending money on their kids. Of course there is nothing wrong with this. Its what parents should do.
But in many areas, that model doesnt happen. Parents want to send their kid to the best option they can. And for some, that is a Catholic school. Since many of the urban Catholic schools have been around for a long time, they are now in older areas of whatever cities and those areas tend to be poorer. Do you really blame a parent for wanting to send their kid to a school with a history and a good program? The people in many of those areas dont have the advantages that others have. But they do utilize an advatage they have, a voucher to a school of their choice.
I personally feel any kid should be able to take the tax dollars and go anywhere they want. Kids should not be relegated to a particular school based on their zip code. No child should be forced to go to a government school.