CHICAGO – Students, parents and school administrators at Chicago’s St. Florian School are hoping Santa will bring them enough cheer to make it through another year.

About $56,000 in cheer.

Last Sunday, school officials and supporters fundraising to keep the school open for another year employed the help of Chicago police sergeant and St. Florian parent Jesse Terrazas, who dressed up as Santa before perching himself on the school’s roof to raise the money necessary to keep the doors open, the Chicago Tribune reports.

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“I will be up here to wave to people in the evening,” Terrazas told the news site. “We will go inside this wonderful hut here. I have books, and hopefully we can find some Internet access. I still need to contact the North Pole and communicate with the elves.”

St. Florian was one of six schools scheduled to close this school year by the Archdiocese of Chicago because of finances. Church officials allowed school leaders to attempt to fundraise to keep the school open, and the school community raised $140,000 over the last year through carwashes, bake sales, a banquet and other means to make it happen, the Tribune reports.

This year, they’re on the same mission, but have only raised about $55,000 so far and have to come up with another $56,000 by the end of the year.

“I think it’s a little bit harder (this year),” parent Van Bensett told the news site. “This year we’ve been doing fundraising, but we haven’t expanded our base of donors. We want to expand our base of donors because you can only ask the same people (for money) so many times.”

That’s where Santa comes in. He knows everybody.

“We are the forgotten part of Chicago because we are surrounded by all the steel mills that closed,” school board member Dawn Klein-Pilota said. “We need to bring awareness here again.”

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The plan is to use Santa to draw attention to the 107-year-old school’s funding predicament. Terrazas has vowed to stay on the roof until the school meets its goal.

“It’s a big commitment, but it’s worth it,” parent Diane Zbinden said of the annual fundraising. “It’s important to the community. It’s important to Catholic education. It’s important to the close-knitted school.”

St. Florian is accepting donations through crowd-funding campaigns on GoFundMe or PayPal, according to the Tribune.

The Northwest Indiana Times reports the school will hold 7 p.m. vigils at the school on Sundays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays until it meets its fundraising goal.

And Santa seemed confident the community will step up when interviewed by CBS.

“We’re reaching out to the entire city of wonderful Chicago citizens to help us,” Terrazas said. “This is a wonderful Catholic institution, and Hegewisch – the community, the furthest southern east community of the city – has been supporting us in our endeavor from the beginning.”