New head of Holy Trinity School will restart classes in Laconia

LACONIA — Dawn Florino wasn’t looking for a leadership role when the superintendent of the diocesan schools asked her to take over Holy Trinity School. The reason she’s the new principal of the city's Catholic school is because the superintendent knew how to sweeten the deal for her.

“I wasn’t interested in it until he expressed his openness to my interest in opening a laboratory school,” Florino said in an interview in her office, which looks out over the Sacred Heart campus of the Saint Andre Bessette parish.

Florino, who is on her way to earning a doctorate in education, has had a long and varied career. She started as a Catholic school teacher, worked in public schools, and for the past seven years has been working with the Diocese of Manchester, which has jurisdiction over the entirety of the state, in various capacities.

One of those has been as a leadership coach, helping other Catholic educators to create what she called “more educationally inclusive schools,” which are more welcoming and supportive for students with diverse instructional needs. She envisions Holy Trinity as becoming a training ground for parochial teachers across the state.

“Eventually, we would like to be able to bring teachers from across the diocese here to train them,” Florino said.

First, though, she has to get the school running again.

Holy Trinity School was created in 1971, when the diocese consolidated three local Catholic schools into one building serving students in grades pre-K through eight. Holy Trinity was located at the intersection of Messer and Church streets for most of that history, and for a couple of years the enrollment reached 200 students.

Recent years haven’t been as robust, though. The school has left its Church Street building — that structure now houses apartments — and instead has filled the former nunnery on the Sacred Heart campus.

The 2024-25 school year was a low point in Holy Trinity’s history. Owing to a difficulty in hiring enough teachers, the diocese was forced to bus students to Seton Academy in Rochester in order to provide them with a Catholic education.

The dislocation came with a heavy toll. By the end of the year, only 10 students were still counted as enrolled at Holy Trinity, Florino said. However, with a refreshed structure, a new principal and a renewed commitment to providing Catholic school in Laconia, she expects enrollment to bounce back quickly.

“I’d love to have about 70 to 75 to re-open,” Florino said. She framed the re-opening as a new beginning, rather than a return to past practices.

“It will not be at all the way it was prior,” Florino said. “That is very purposeful. This is going to be an entirely different school.”

By way of elaboration, Florino said Holy Trinity will be “an authentically Catholic school.” The former chapel, first built for use by nuns who resided in the building, had been used in recent years for storage. The clutter has since been removed, and it is again a space for prayer and reverence.

“We will be able to attend mass, we will have a children’s rosary,” Florino said, noting the curriculum has also been steeped in religious identity, “so it feels like a Catholic school.”

“The sense was this was once a Catholic institution, and we are going to make sure that it is again a Catholic institution,” she said. “It has to be unapologetic about that.”

Showing students what it feels like to be part of a Catholic community is among the most important things Holy Trinity can do, she said, in addition to providing education.

On the topic of education, Florino said one of the hallmarks of instruction at the school will be a decidedly low-tech experience, at least for the students. Teachers and administrators will use modern tools for efficiency, but students will spend little if any time with screens.

Florino said the objective of that strategy is “creating a sacred, quiet, peaceful space. The world is a very noisy place right now.”

Florino said she’s planning to reach out to families who have left Holy Trinity in recent years, and hopes to attract a new batch of students to the school.

“What I would really want families to know is the amount of effort everyone of the team members I’ve talked to in making sure this is a school where children will really understand what it’s supposed to feel like to be a member of the Catholic faith,” Florino said. “Everyone can educate, the difference is, this will feel very different for the children and their families.”

Holy Trinity School will have students again in the fall, whether Florino gets the 70 students she hopes for or if she has only enough for one classroom, she said. An open house is scheduled for 5:30 to 7 p.m. on Monday, May 12, another one is planned for June, and there will be more through the summer for prospective families.

Great hopes

One member of the Holy Trinity School Board of Directors is Bob Soucy, who also serves on city council.

Soucy said, based on Florino’s background and reputation, "We thought we wouldn’t be able to find anyone better. In talking to some other teachers, she came greatly recommended.”

There’s a rising tide for private schooling, Soucy noted, and said he thinks Holy Trinity could draw from beyond just Laconia, as well as from local families who don’t attend Catholic churches.

“Just because you are not Catholic doesn’t mean you can’t go there,” Soucy said. “We are open to all children that want to come to school."

In recent years, “the challenge was staffing. We are hoping now to get over that challenge,” Soucy said. “I have great hopes for the school.”