Pinkson added that previous numbers and photos shared by the media were misleading.
"For the record, there were 16 statues on campus prior to the school year and today there are 10 statues on campus," she said.
She added that another photo of a statue that had been published had actually been in storage since 1965.
"In addition...at the start of this school year we moved our statue of St. Dominic to a more prominent place at the center of our school and put up a plaque honoring St. Dominic as our School's patron saint. The plaque was placed the first week of school, prior to this news cycle. There has been and there is no plan to move any other statues," she added.
Fitzgerald said she was concerned that the removal of the statues was only the latest in an overall backing away from the school's Catholic identity, including "the word 'Catholic' has been removed from the mission statement, sacraments were removed from the curriculum, the lower school curriculum was changed to world religions, the logo and colors were changed to be 'less Catholic,' and the uniform was changed to be less Catholic," she said.
Cecily Stock, Head of School, told the Marin Independent Journal that the removal of sacraments from the curriculum was on account of a lack of interest from families, not an attempt to erase the school's Catholic identity.
"Over the last few years we've had fewer Catholic students as part of the community and a larger number of students of various faith traditions. Right now about 80 percent of our families do not identify as Catholic."
Kate Martin, Director of Communications for the Dominican Sisters of San Rafael, told CNA that the publicity surrounding the removal of the statues has sparked a "good but hard" conversation about how to be welcoming of everyone while maintaining a Catholic identity.
She said the question can be especially difficult in a place as religiously and ethnically diverse as California, where Christian and Catholic values are not common.
"The Dominican values are still being taught (at the school) every minute, but there are lots of other families that have been coming to the school. How do we reach out and embrace everybody who wants this Dominican education?...how do we continue Catholic education and have lots of different families of different backgrounds?" she said.
Martin added that she did not believe the school "intended for this kind of upset" and that the sisters would be looking into the situation more deeply in the coming days, including exactly how many statues were removed or remained, and what will happen to the statues that will no longer be displayed.
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Mary Farrow worked as a staff writer for Catholic News Agency until 2020. She has a degree in journalism and English education from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.