Our History
When our Sisters of St. Joseph arrived on the shores of St. Augustine, Florida in 1866, we responded to God’s call to leave our familiar surroundings in Le Puy, France to come educate the newly freed slaves following the end of the Civil War.
Our original eight sisters arrived impelled by faith and an unrelenting passion to serve those who had no voice, and within 20 years, 50% of the black population could read and write in our community. Following those humble beginnings, our call and territory expanded from Northeast Florida down to South Florida and everywhere in between. Today, we are being called to respond to the inequities faced by young single mothers and their children to empower them to be the people God wants them to be.