Academy Newsletter 12/17/08

:  Exams are now underway and once we get through Friday we all look forward to the Christmas break.  School resumes on Monday, January 5, which is the last day of the second quarter.  Report cards will be mailed home on Friday, January 9.  When we come back we will have a special visitor with us.  Following is information I shared with the students and the whole school community this week:

 

When we come back from the Christmas break the Academy will have an artist in residence working with us for the month of January.  Filmmaker Ed Radtke (www.transparentfilms.com) will be working with Academy students from January 5-30 teaching them about the art of film and guiding them in creating their own films.  Our culminating event will be a premier of the students’ films on Thursday, January 29 at 7:00 p.m. at the Maumee Indoor Theater.

 

While Ed is with us we will opportunities for students and staff from the entire SJJ community to meet him and work with him.  One of our events will be a screening of one of his award winning films, “The Dream Catcher” or “The Speed of Life” followed by a discussion with Ed.

 

If any group would like to meet with him or work with him during his time here please let me know and we’ll set something up.

 

Ed’s residency is made possible by a grant we received from the Ohio Arts Council.  Last spring Dave Hartwig (who now teaches English in the high school) did a great deal of work putting the application together for us and we won on our first try—a rare accomplishment.

 

Please join us in welcoming Ed when he arrives on January 5.

 

We recently out together a list of activities that took place during the first semester and we were all surprised at how long it is.  The second semester will be just as buys.  Along with the residency students will be preparing for MathCounts, Science Olympiad, and Power of the Pen and we’ll be offering an opportunity to learn to swim at the nearby Wolf Creek YMCA and 8^th graders will have the opportunity to learn to scuba dive at Aqua Hut on Reynolds Road. 

 

A major initiative we will be involving all the students in is our “Go Green” initiative.  Some of the students have been working with Mrs. Chambers laying the foundation for some big events in March and April around this theme.  A major piece of this program is creating awareness of the need to literally bring light to those who live in darkness. Over 1 billion people in the world do not have access to electricity and as a result, have no reliable source of light in the night.  Mr. Nichols directed us to “BOGO” lights, solar cell lights that  bring people out of the dark.  Mrs. Chambers and the BOGO people have put together a program that will go national, “Schools Lighting the Way.”  Here is a link to the site,  http://www.schoolslightingtheway.com/    you will notice that the Academy is highlighted as the first program to join the program.  It is our hope to contact other schools and invite them to join us and build this into a “Light the World” event on Earth Day in the spring.  There will be much more to come.

 

Thank you for your generous response to our Christmas collection.  We ended up with over $640.00 to purchase gifts for the two families we assisted.  While we are on the topic of generosity, the school recently received a tremendous gift from Mrs. Mary Lou Fox in honor of her son, Carty Fox ’86.  Catry passed away a few years ago after a battle with cancer and in his memory the commons has been renamed the “Carty Fox Commons.”  You will notice a sign representing this memorial on your next visit to the school. 

 

We also want to extend out thanks to senior Zach Francis who volunteers his time three mornings a week to come in early and give guitar lessons to Academy students.  Zach is our “Guitar Hero.”

 

Sadly, we offer our condolences to the families of 8^th grade student Austin Gardner and 7^th grade student Hunter Clay.  Austin’s grandfather, Dallas Gardner passed away last Friday and Hunter’s great-grandfather, Daniel Kajfasz, passed away on December 6.  This is an especially difficult time of year to lose a loved one and our sympathy goes out to all who will miss these good men.

 

Last Friday the Academy students had the chance to meet an Olympic Gold Medalist, wrestler Brandon Slay, who won gold at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Australia.    

Brandon had a great message for the boys and you might have seen a clip from his appearance on the Friday night 11:00 p.m. newscast on WTVG-13.    

 

Even though school will be out I know many of the boys will be here at different times for basketball or wrestling practice and on Saturday, January 3 we will host Deveaux Junior High in a 7^th and 8^th grade basketball double header starting at 1:00 p.m.  It would be great to have a big crowd for the games as there is a good chance that BCSN will be here to broadcast the 8^th grade game. 

 

I will be in the office quite a bit during the break—believe it or not, when it’s quiet I get a lot of work done!  Fell free to contact me during the break if I can be of assistance with anything.

 

Thank you for your support and encouragement during the first semester and enjoy a safe, happy, and blessed Christmas.

 

Academy Newsletter 12/9/08

As we move closer to the Christmas break we also move closer to the end of our mission collection.  Each grade has been assigned a family to collect money and purchase gifts for.  The 8^th grade has a family with four boys ages 12, 9, 8, 5 and two girls, ages 14 and 9.  The 7^th grade has a family with three boys, ages 6, 2, and 18 months.  Thursday is the last day to bring in money for each grade.  Currently the 8^th grade has $106.75 and the 7^th grade has $175.35.  Please contribute whatever you can to help us make Christmas a little merrier for these families.  On Thursday after school students will go to the K Mart on Reynolds Road to shop for these families with the money that has been collected.  Any parents who would like to “assist and guide” the student shoppers are welcome to join them this Thursday after school at K Mart.

 

Congratulations to our Lego Robotics team—they repeated as district champions on Saturday and are headed to the state finals!  Team members Harry Thaman, Amir Horani, Sean Wheelock, Dominic Zirbel, Andrew Kurtz, Nick Carroll, Isaac Lepow, Raymond Antypas, Russell Zieroff, Nick Brodie and Stephen Beyer did an outstanding job.  We are also very grateful to coaches Vicki Kurtz, Carol Wedding, and faculty member Joni Trempe.  As always, the boys  

 

A reminder—there is a meeting tonight at 7:00 p.m. in the commons for any student and parents interested in joining a Boy Scout troop that is forming here at the Academy.

 

We had three teams compete in the Knowledge Master Open last week.  This is a national quiz in which 639 middle school teams competed.  Our tope team posted a score of 1388 which placed them 99^th in the country and 3^rd in the state of Ohio.  Congratulations to leading team members Harry Thaman, Dominic Zirbel, Dominic Scarlett, Connor Bopp, and Sean Wheelock. 

 

Academy newsletter 12/1/08

I hope everyone enjoyed the Thanksgiving break.  As we begin the week and the month of December we have 12 days of school before semester exams begin on December 17.  Our focus will be preparing the students for exams while also remembering the needs of others at this time of the year.  The season of Advent, a season waiting and anticipating the birth of Jesus, began yesterday and we will observe the season in a variety of ways including a reconciliation service this morning.  Also, the Academy, along with the rest of the school, will be collecting money to provide Christmas gifts for families in need.  We are asking each Academy student to bring in $3 to be used to purchase gifts for a family.  Each grade is being assigned one family and on Thursday, December 11 Academy students will join high school students in shopping for gifts at the K Mart on Reynolds Road.  Please encourage your son to participate in our collection.

 

The exam schedule is as follows:

Wednesday, December 17          8:25-9:55 a.m. Math

                                                10:05-11:35 a.m.  Theology

 

Thursday, December 18              8:25-9:55 a.m.   Science

                                                10:105-11:35 a.m.   Social Studies

 

Friday, December 19                  8:25-9:55 a.m.   English

                                                10:05-11:35        Foreign Language

 

Students are free to leave each day as soon as their last exam is completed.

 

A special note for 8^th grader students and their parents:  we will administer the high school placement test to all 8^th grade students on Friday, December 5.  This will substitute for the Saturday morning administration test of the test.  There is a $20 fee to score the test.  Please send the money in with your son on Friday.  We will make sure that the administration of the test will not conflict with any high school classes your son may be in.

 

Basketball season is getting underway and one of our 7^th grade teams has already won a tournament.  Congratulations to the members of Coach Periatt’s team who won the St. Pius Invitational.  We are fortunate to have many SJJ alumni coaching our teams this season.  We have three teams in each grade and we are thankful for the coaches who volunteer their time and for Athletic Director Nick Butler who coordinates all our athletic programs and attends many of the games each weekend.

 

Thanks to the efforts of Maria Zirbel, mother of Dominic, we have opportunities for our students to compete against other schools in chess matches.  Today the boys will play against Perrysburg Junior High after school.

 

Our Lego Robotics team will be defending their district championship next Saturday, December 6 at the Toledo Technology Academy.  Thanks to coaches Joni Trempe, school Tech Coordinator, and Vicki Kurtz and Carol Wedding, engineers and generous volunteers, for all their time and effort working with the team.  The theme for the competition focuses on alternative energy and in that spirit the students have a unique opportunity tomorrow after school as they will tour the facilities of Xunlight, an emerging producer of solar panels.    

 

This week we will be registering for the “Power of the Pen” writing competition.  Several of the students have expressed an interest in participating, but, unfortunately we usually have conflicts with basketball games. I’ll be asking all interested students to bring a note from their parents indicating that they can, indeed, participate in the competition on Saturday morning, January 31.  We should have basketball schedules for all the teams by tomorrow so you can make an informed decision.

 

Have a great week and encourage your son to use the Learning Center for any assistance he may need as exams draw closer.