Miss. District Has Forged Strong Ties With Local Parochial Schools

In Illinois, the state's largest school system draws attention for reaching out to its parochial school neighbor, but several hundred miles down river, the distinctions of public and private have long seemed of little relevance to school officials.

Sitting at the edge of the bluffs overlooking Louisiana and the Mississippi Delta, the community of Natchez, Miss., has proved to be fertile ground for growing partnerships between the city's public and Roman Catholic schools.

The 6,000-student Natchez-Adams public school district routinely provides professionals to do teacher evaluations of staff members at the nearby Cathedral School, a pre-K-12 Catholic school founded a century and a half ago. They also hold joint staff-development sessions in such...