Raffel, dance, and THe Phantom!

Today or tomorrow you should receive a packet of five raffle tickets for the 2007 Dodge Caliber that the school is raffling off. Tickets are $20.00 each and $4.00 of each tocket sold goes to your son’s field trip account. The school office has enclosed a slip for you to sign to acknowledge receipt of the tickets. Please return the slip to me as soon as possible. If you don’t wish to sell the tickets that is fine, just retun the unsold tickets to the Academy. If you would like more tickets to sell let me know and we’ll send you more. Regardless, thanks for your consideration in this matter.

Academy basketball sweatshirts are available for order. The hooded sweatshirts cost $30.00 each and names will be printed on the back. They’re great for parents and players. Ask your son for an order form and please return it to school as soon as possible so we can have them for the rest of the season.

Even though we’re on the verge of our Christmas break the 8th grade students have an exciting event to look forward when they return to school–on Thursday, Janaury 4 the 8th grade will attend a performance of “The Phantom of the Opera” at 2:00 p.m. at the Stranahan Theatre. We will need some parents to help with driving and we have a few tickets available for drivers. If you can help, let me know. The show will conclude @ 4:30 p.m. We’ll be spending a lot of time with the 8th grade when they return from break discussing the play both before and after the performance. We will ask each student to contribuet $10.00 towards the cost of their ticket, but if this is a hardship, especially, after Christmas, we will waive the cost for any students who don’t bring or send any money in. We feel this is a unique opportunity for the students and don’t want to miss the chance to see a high-quality theatrical production.

ONe other calendar note for January: there will be a dance for both 7th and 8th grade students here at SJJ on Friday, January 12 from 7:00-9:30 p.m.

Exams, news and notes

Next week semester exams will be held. These exams account for 20% of your son’s semester grade. The other 80% is split between the first and second quarter grades. The exam schedule is as follows:

Wednesday: Science and Foreign Language

Thursday: English and Theology

Friday: Social Studies and Math

The first exam begins at 8:25 a.m. and ends at 9:55 a.m. The second exam runs from 10:05-11:35. Students may leave when their exams for the day are finished.

On Friday students are invited to stay for a Christmas party after the last exam. The party will conclude by 2:00 p.m.l

Congratulations to Spencer Crawford, Ryan Shields, Jacob Byczynski, Cody Brown, James O’Shea, Ian Mills, Kyle Hueston, Caleb Edwards, Lucas Pike, Mark Antiporda, and Asher Rieck for their outstanding showing in the Lego Robotics competition last Saturday. The team received an award for “Quality of Research.” Thanks to coach Joni Trempe for all the time and effort she put in working with the guys.

This weekend several Academy students will be performing during the all school Christmas concerts. The band students will play Saturday night in the main chapel beginning at 7:00 p.m. and the choral performers will present their concert Sunday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. in the chapel. Hope you can come and enjoy some great music and support the boys.

Be sure to check the Academy web page on the school website-www.sjjtitans.org. Mr. Crawford keeps it updated and you will also find a link to teacher pages. Both Mr. Szynkowski and Mr. Nichols have been posting their notes from class on their websites.

Thanks to all who contributed to the Christmas collection and helped with the shopping. We were able to help make Christmas a little brighter for two families in need.

Yesterday, seven students accompanied Mr. Brennan and I to Harborside Care Center in Swanton. The guys played games and visited with the residents and, as always, handled themselves very well.

Today, Mr. Nichols and Mr. Heintschel lead half of the 8th grade on a unique experience–a tour of the new Glass City Veterans Skyway being constructed in northeast Toledo. They had a once in a lifetime up close look at the largest bridge building project in state history. Check the website in a few days for pictures. The other half of the 8th grade will tour the site in February.

Encourage your son to spend some time this weekend reviewing for exams. A little time invested now will pay off on the exams.

Fun Day, exam schedule and more

This Sunday, December 10 we will hold an “Academy/Big Brother Fun Day” here at school from 2:00-5:00 p.m. We’ll have a gym open, board and card games, and a video game system on hand for the Academy guys and their high school “big brothers”. We’ll also provide pizza, pop, and snacks. Students can come for all or part of the afternoon, it’s just an opPortunity to have some fun with classmates and “Big brothers.”

Tomorrow morning, Friday, we will start the day with mass celebrating the Catholic feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary.

This past Tuesday I accompanied ten of our students to visit with the residents of Oakleaf Village, an assisted living retirement center. As usual, the guys handled themselves very well and made a great impression. Next Tuesday another group of students will visit the residents of Harborside in Swanton.

On Wednesday half our the 8th grade class will have a very unique opportunity-a two hour tour of the “Glass City Veterans Skyway” now under construction. This bridge is the largest public construction project in state history and the students will see up close the engineering, construction, and design principles being used in the process.

The exam schedule has been set: Science and Foreign Language on Wednesday, December 20

English and Theology on Thursday, December, 21

Social Studies and Math on Friday, December 22

We will conclude our Christmas collection on Tuesday, December 12. Each grade is collecting money to buy presents for a family of three boys and a mom. Students and volunteer moms will go shopping after school on Tuesday at Target with the money that is collected.

Look for the Academy in “The Blade-a reporter was here visiting the Chinese class today for a story they are working on. It might be in this weekend