They rallied around her as a family would when she suffered a recurrence of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a form of cancer, in fourth grade.

And again in 1997, when Somers lost her father to pancreatic cancer, they showered her with prayer, comfort and support.

The faculty and staff are “really caring, they put students before themselves,” she said. “It’s just like home.”

Now in the eighth grade, the highest grade taught at Sacred Heart, Somers says she will miss that when she leaves.

But it’s part of what she believes has prepared her to take that step and beyond, she hopes, to Duke University and a career as a doctor.

Another part is the discipline the school instills in its students, discipline Somers says will not only make her a better student, but a better person.

And the school is founded on the religious principals of the Catholic church, which Somers, although a Presbyterian, treasures, as well.

“Without it,” she says of reverence for God, “we really wouldn’t have gone to the next level of learning and family atmosphere.”

It’s that spirit that Catholic Schools Week celebrates Jan. 31-Feb. 4. The school has planned activities each day.

And it may be just what the school’s founders had in mind in 1882, when they began teaching Sacred Heart Parish’s Catholic children.

Salisbury Catholic School closed and reopened several times in the late 1800s and early 1900s until the Sisters of Mercy began instructing in their convent in 1910.

The name became Sacred Heart Catholic School in 1942, when the church entered a new diocese. The church constructed the current school building in 1965.

Since the school began teaching seventh and eighth grades again in the early 1990s, after dropping those grades in 1969, enrollment has grown to 266.

Following trends in other schools, including public schools, Sacred Heart has seen its Hispanic student population grow and has added two mobile units to serve all its students.

One of them is used by kindergarten and first-grade classes, but the school plans to move seventh and eighth grades into them, said Kathleen Miller.

“We want to double enrollment and double the size of the school,” Miller said. “But that’s down the road.”

Miller is Sacred Heart’s first lay principal. She took over the school in 1997 after the Sisters of Mercy withdrew from it.

Formerly a special-education teacher in Virginia, Miller is Catholic. As the school’s spiritual leader, the principal has to be, she said.

But many of Sacred Heart’s 13 full-time and eight part-time teachers aren’t Catholic. And 90 of the school’s students aren’t, either.

That doesn’t matter, Miller said. More important at Sacred Heart is the Christian faith and its message, and that is the common thread woven throughout the school.

“We just really emphasize Christian values, treating one another with respect, taking care of one another,” she said. “When all is said and done, it’s how you behave toward one another that’s going to determine how successful you are as an adult.”

Signs of the faith are everywhere at Sacred Heart.

Crucifixes hang over a sign that tells young students to “Be Polite,” beside a map of the world in the library and near a whimsical poster picturing a dog at a keyboard at the computer lab.

In the kindergarten classroom, children explain their favorite toys for show-and-tell beneath a crucifix hanging above the chalkboard.

On every classroom door, blue and yellow signs declare that room a “Christ Centered Zone.”

A picture of Jesus with a bleeding heart (the Sacred Heart) adorns a wall near a row of gray lockers — none of which have locks, Miller proudly points out — in the narrow hallway.

Many students enter the school at the rear, passing a stone grotto with a white statue of the Virgin Mary, her head down, her hands turned outward.

Just inside those rear doors are two sets of the 10 Commandments, one on each side. But Miller won’t enter the public schools fray over whether simply posting them makes students better people.

“I don’t know if having them posted makes that much of an impact,” she said. “We also are a school family, and we support each other.”

And that means prayer, lots of prayer, at Sacred Heart. They pray at the day’s beginning and end, and at least once in between.

They pray for those in crisis, for students who have done something wrong, for students or others with a need great or small.

“I try to make it a habit to pray before tests,” she said. “And if I’m having a rough day ... it kind of helps me realize that God was with me the whole time.”

Another constant at the school is parents who throw their support behind the school, its students and employees, said fourth-grade teacher Crystal Cornelison.

That’s what has kept Cornelison, who is not Catholic, at the school for 10 years and will keep her here until she retires, she said.

“The Christian atmosphere and the love you feel at this school, that’s very important,” she said. “I love it. It’s like family.”

And those parents help the school by volunteering. One parent has volunteered his time to build brick foundations under the outside units.

Others coach sports, or sell concessions, or do whatever else is needed, Miller said.

Janine Lawson, whose son, Alex, is a third-grader at Sacred Heart, volunteered in the cafeteria this week.

The former public school teacher chose Sacred Heart for its small class sizes and strong academic reputation.

“I wanted a school that had a tried-and-true track record, and Sacred Heart had that,” she said, taking a break from making chocolate chip cookies.

The school follows state guideline instructions and is fully accredited by the N.C. Department of Public Instruction.

And, Miller said, the school is working toward certification by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, which requires a school counselor and improvement plan.

Though her family is not Catholic and her son “argues with me on occasion that he is Catholic,” Lawson said, she’s glad Alex is being exposed to religion in school.

Part of that exposure is what students call “doing the Mass.” Each Friday, a group of students from a different grade level helps the Rev. Thomas Clement with the service.

Most of the time, second- through eighth-grade classes lead prayers and songs. Near the end of the school year, the kindergarten and first-graders take a turn.

Students take up most of the seating in the church sanctuary, filing out of the pews near the end to take communion or receive a blessing from Clement or Miller.

They return to rows that are either all boys or all girls. Somers sits on one of them with her “sisters.”

Leaving the church, students return to school, where trophies and bookbags line the tops of lockers without locks and grades are handed out in the shadow of the cross.

At the end of the day, they will pray, perhaps the Act of Contrition, asking God’s forgiveness for their sins.

Somers won’t be doing this next year, when she attends a public high school. But she won’t soon forget it, or any of her time at Sacred Heart, she said.