AUBURN — A group of Saint Dominic Academy parents and alumni announced Wednesday they hope to have a site for a private high school by November and begin enrolling students in January for the 2026-27 school year.

The Saint Dominic Regional High School board wrote in a news release that plans are moving forward for a “a fully independent private high school, in the Catholic tradition, starting in the fall of 2026.”

While the group searches for a site, one building that is not a prospect is Saint Dominic Academy’s former high school at 121 Gracelawn Road in Auburn, which closed in June. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland cited low enrollment and operating losses of $2.5 million from 2020-25 as reasons for the closure.

This week the diocese announced Saint Dominic Academy’s remaining K-8 program at the former Holy Cross School on Baird Avenue in Lewiston will move to the Auburn campus in January 2026.

The group of parents, alumni and supporters behind the effort to start a new high school were eyeing the Auburn campus for possible use. In light of the diocese’s announcement, the group said they are “actively exploring alternative sites in the Lewiston-Auburn area for their independent high school.”

After the diocese announced it would close the high school component of Saint Dominic Academy, a group of parents, alumni and supporters assembled a new Saint Dominic Regional High School board of directors and filed paperwork as an independent nonprofit entity separate from the Diocese of Portland, “while also attempting to work with the Diocese to explore options to lease part or all of its former Auburn campus.”

The board anticipates choosing a new site by November and enrolling students in January for the 2026-27 school year.

Eric Samson, father of two Saint Dom’s graduates, has been a part of that process since the beginning, although he didn’t officially join the board. He said Wednesday he’s in hopes that both schools — the K-8 group heading to the former high school campus in Auburn and the new school planned by the board — will succeed.

“There are many committed to the return of Saint Dom’s high school and I appreciate that,” Samson said.

Like others, though, Samson said the community would have been better served if the diocese had announced plans to move younger students to the academy when news of the high school closure was first announced.

The move being announced so late in the year, Samson said, “will create further obstacles for those of us interested in resurrecting the high school outside of control of the diocese.”

The news release Wednesday did not reveal what, if any, particular sites in Lewiston-Auburn are being considered.

The goal for the school, board members said, is to recreate “an affordable small-school option providing a joyful faith-based community offering rigorous college-preparatory academics in a close-knit and supportive environment.”