The Beauty of Broken Mirrors

 

The Beauty of Broken Mirrors

By Anthony Maranise, Obl.S.B.

 

In the hectic bustle and scurrying that can be our lives sometimes, we have the tendency to overlook certain luxuries. Many of us, I would venture to guess, likely take for granted the common mirror. Yes, the mirror is a luxury in that we do not need it to ‘get by’ in this world or this life, though it helps tremendously. Imagine how much more difficult driving would be without that polished reflective glass there to be of assistance. But I digress. Most of us use or rely on mirrors within our homes— whether they be decorative or for personal grooming, dressing, etc. They are a common luxury; this much we know.

NEEDTOBREATHE

Some months ago, a loved one (who most unfortunately has ‘fallen away’) and I were discussing our mutual enjoyment of the contemporary rock and Christian music group known as ‘NeedToBreathe’. One of their newer songs is entitled, “Banks”, and has a beautiful lyrical verse within it. Truth be told, this verse alone inspired the composition of this article with a bit of prayerful reflection with the song itself. The verse intones, “If you ever feel like you’re not enough, I’m going to break all your mirrors.”

Now, “why”, I thought, “would someone break another’s mirrors because they felt like they weren’t (good) enough?” I stayed with this thought for a while not primarily because of the question it evoked within me, but instead because of how the verse resonated with my own soul and ‘interior disposition.’ I often feel like I am not (good) enough – whether that be for my colleagues, my principal, my doctoral studies professors, my friends, my parents, my girlfriends over the years, and most importantly of all, for God Himself. While I would like to believe I am not alone in feeling this way, I wonder if perhaps I do not, for some reason, feel this inadequacy more often than others. Alas, that is something I will take with me into further spiritual direction.

 

During the recitation of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy one afternoon, accompanied in prayer by my seventh-grade scholars, the answer to the question finally ‘dawned’ on me. Why would someone break another’s mirrors because they felt like they weren’t (good) enough?

 

Because mirrors show us only our external reflections. Designed to provide a clear and full reflection, they can, at best, only ever accomplish half their intended purpose. Mirrors cannot show us the most authentic, real, affirming, and beautiful reflection of all, namely, the ways in which we reflect the imago Dei in which we have been created (cf. Genesis 1:27)!

 

Thus, if we stare into our external reflections alone and for long enough, we will begin to believe what we see in those reflections. We might, for example, see one whose hair has begun to grey; one whose face is distorted by stress wrinkles; whose torso bears the marks of surgeries, injuries, or even ‘stretch-marks’ from weight gain. If we focus too intently on our external appearances, we run two risks of excess: (1) either we begin to see ourselves as inadequate and grotesque or (2) we begin to see ourselves in a rather narcissistically positive lens, forgetting that though we are created in the image and likeness of God, we are still sinners “in need of God’s mercy in which we ought never lose hope” (Rule of Saint Benedict, 4.74).

I might content that insofar as mirrors only show us ‘the lesser half’ of our true selves (the external), they are all somewhat ‘broken.’ Yet, here is the beauty of it all (and the simultaneous beauty of these ‘broken’ mirrors):

We were and are, moment-by-moment, loved into existence by the One who, at our creation, looked at us and proclaimed what we will hope to hear again as we enter into ‘eternal Easter’, namely, these phrases: “Very good!” (Genesis 1:31) and “It is I who have fearfully and wonderfully made you!” (Psalms 139:14).

Therefore, next time you gaze into your reflection in a mirror, I encourage you to remember these three things: (1) You are using a ‘broken’ instrument to provide you with a less than full reflection of who you truly are, (2) Who you truly are is God’s child and as such you are created in His own dazzling image and likeness, and (3) As a result of that creation alone, you are more than (good) enough!

 

About the Author

 

Anthony Maranise, Obl.S.B. is the middle school religion instructor at St. Ann Catholic School of Bartlett (TN) and is a doctoral scholar in the Ed.D. program for interdisciplinary leadership at Creighton University (Omaha, NE). Apart from these roles, Anthony is the author of five books, a New Memphis Institute research and leadership fellow, a certified chaplain, and an oblate of the Order of Saint Benedict associated with St. Bernard Abbey (Cullman, AL). You may learn more about him by visiting his personal website at: amaranis.wix.com/amjm or by visiting his LinkedIn profile at: www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-maranise.

 

Let Your Light Shine Before Others

Fr. Ernie usually ends his homilies by giving his parishioners an assignment. I see these assignments as a challenge for us to live Matthew 5:16. "Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good works and give glorify to your Father who is in heaven."

At Mass last evening, Fr. Ernie talked about the need for hope and salvation, and how Rev. Billy Graham said those are two things we all need. We need to live our lives in such a way that we have hope in a salvation that there is more in store for us after our time here on Earth. Because of God's love for us, we received and continue to receive the gift of salvation through Jesus in the Eucharist. Life has little purpose and meaning if we do not have hope in salvation for eternal life.

Fr. Ernie then challenged us to live our Christianity. We are to model that hope in the way we live our lives, and that modeling is to begin the moment we leave Mass and encounter the world.

During his homily, I thought about the way I live my Christianity, and how I need to do a better job of living my faith. Those thoughts quickly turned to the many ways I see people living their faith through the school day. In my role at St. Ann, I am constantly on the move throughout the school doing my best to support the students, teachers, staff, volunteers, and parents. I try to not spend much time at my desk. Instead, I have the privilege of seeing "light shine before others" constantly.

During Mass, I whispered to my wife to please remind me that my next blog would be on how I see people live their Christianity every day. So, here is a list of thirty ways I see people living their faith at St. Ann Catholic School.

I see people living their Christianity when:

• May Young and George Dhuy volunteer every morning to work the carpool line no matter the weather condition. They greet each student and family with a helping hand and a smile.
• Jane Gillespie and Linda Garvey-Meisler are waiting at the classroom door at the end of the day to work with the Knowledge Bowl team.
• Kris Miller tells her 4th grade students the story during religion class about her conversion to Catholicism.
• Tricia Cooper's Kindergarteners sing Christian hymns as they do their seat work.
• Selina Trouy in a very motherly and loving way helps a student who is not feeling well or sternly yet compassionately deals with a student sent to the office for a much needed time out.
• I walk into the library and see Jim and MaryAnn Hall, Trena Kilp, Marilou Smith, Linda Sones, Jean Bedwell, Nancy Howland, and Marla Ferguson helping the students and teachers during library time.
• Annmarie Ghio organizes the monthly Rosary, St. Faustina Youth Society, and Eucharistic Ministers in promoting Catholic faith and charism.
• Angela de Jong goes the extra mile to organize the Band Trip, school play, Knowledge Bowl competition, and Pajama Drive for Catholic Charities.
• The Burns kids are piling out of their car with backpacks flying, a smile on their faces, and being fired up about school.
• Joner Tadrous and Amaya Bolton are walking together to their next class always laughing and full of life.
• The PK students are lined-up and greet me with a "Good Morning Mr. Aur."
• Savannah Bannister is the first student to enter the office each morning to turn on the lights and say good morning.
• Rocco Jimenez helps his little sister, Ivy, get out of their van and into the school building upon arrival.
• I get a high-five from the Petteys triplets.
• The middle schoolers escort the PK students to school Mass. Or, is it the PKers escorting the middle schoolers to school Mass?
• The Knights of Columbus put on extra fundraisers to help St. Ann families with much needed tuition assistance.
• Tony Mulrooney volunteers to help renovate the library, install security cameras, and build the set for the school play. Tony has many talents.
• Everyone in the carpool line gets a hug from Mahealani Siaulaiga.
• The 8th graders go to Ave Maria to spend time with the residents.
• My students sing in the youth choir on Sunday mornings.
• The school choir sings at the school Mass.
• The Knowledge Bowl team prays before each round of competition.
• 1st and 2nd graders answer Fr. Ernie's questions at Mass.
• So many of our 5th-8th graders are Altar Servers.
• Mariela Granados kneels to receive Communion.
• Stacey Griffith and Billy Gage serve as Godparents for an 8th grader being Baptized in preparation for First Communion and Confirmation.
• Teachers are in prayer before Mass.
• Enrique Montiel gives of his time, treasure, and talent to repair the kitchen equipment when needed.
• Abe Abuelouf and Anthony Maranise step in to team teach 8th grade Religion/Confirmation class.
• Parents sacrifice to be able to give their children a Catholic education. And, it is a sacrifice; a very worthwhile and important sacrifice.

St. Ann is a great Catholic School. Our students, families, and staff live their Christian faith daily. I see it in many more ways than these thirty ways. Every day I see it more and more. God continually blesses us in so many ways. It is up to all of us to thank him by letting our light shine and live our Christian faith.

God bless you,

Didier Aur, Principal

St. Ann Catholic School

Previous Blog: https://didieraur.blogspot.com/2020/02/another-great-catholic-schools-week.html

What Makes St. Ann a Catholic School is...

St. Ann Students at
Madonna Learning Center

Even though this is only my second year at St. Ann, this is my twenty-eighth year working is Catholic Schools (and my thirty-first in education). I have to admit that I need to sometimes step back and remind myself that St. Ann is a Catholic School first and foremost. Even though I never forget that it is a Catholic School, I sometimes have to remind myself what being a Catholic School means, and it is not just having Catholic in the school's name.

So, I thought this would be a great topic for this week's blog: What Makes St. Ann a Catholic School... 

Colts Running Club at
Autism Awareness Run

The most important thing we do during the week is to attend Mass every Thursday with Fr. Ernie. During the school Mass, 5th-8th graders sing in school choir, serve as Altar Servers, and students in grades 1-8 serve as lectors. The students also run the AV equipment for our school Mass. Mass with Fr. Ernie also becomes a Catholic question and answer session. This has become a neat part of our Mass.

Prayer is an important part of being a Catholic School. We pray the Rosary together on the first Friday of every month. We begin the school day praying the WIT Prayer followed by the Act of Contrition. We end every day praying the Hail Holy Queen (Salve Regina). We also pray before lunch.

Colts Running Club at
FedEx Family House Run

We also recite the school mission statement after the prayers and Pledge of Allegiance. "Our mission is to provide a Catholic education through faith, service, and love." The staff rewrote this mission statement last year and reviewed it again this year to make it reflect what we do every day.

Our 7th and 8th graders partner with Ave Maria Home to do service projects to help the residents and improve the grounds. This is part of the service work our 7th and 8th graders need for confirmation. Even if the students aren't going through confirmation, they are still required to perform these service hours.

During the school year, the 2nd graders prepare for first reconciliation and first communion.

Cop Stop

The 8th graders study Theology of the Body in the spring. They have also started a new program called Angel Wings. The 8th graders do this every Friday morning. The students write letters and prayers for teachers they appreciate. On Friday morning, they put on their angel wings and go read their prayers for the teachers. It is nice having students praying for the teachers.

St. Faustina Youth Society volunteers at Room in the Inn to feed the homeless, Madonna Learning Center, Shepherd's Haven, Ave Maria, and St. Vincent de Paul Food Pantry. They have fed first responders in our community, participated in Cop Stop through the Bartlett Police Department, and taken food to the Bartlett Fire Station on Alturia. The students of St. Faustina also pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet once a month.

Collecting Food for SVdP

Volleyball teams supported Dorothy Day House a couple of weeks ago by raising money and collecting needed items.

Every Catholic teacher became certified Eucharistic ministers under the guidance of Jerri Hess.

Colts Running Club participated in charity runs for Autism Awareness and FedEx Family House.

Journalism Club raises money for St. Jude in the fall and Catholic Charities in the spring. They also organized a book drive also for Catholic Charities and diaper drive for Birthright.

Reading Adventures with PDO

The school hosts Trivia Night every spring for the St. Connie Scholarship Fund to help families with tuition assistance.

8th graders team up with Kindergarten students in our school's Big Brother, Big Sister mentoring program.

The 3rd graders partner with students at Parents' Day Out in Reading Adventure with Ms. Cindy's students.

Praying the Divine Chaplet

The Beta Club members prepare Christmas boxes for children in poorer areas. Their boxes went to Ecuador and Peru last year through Samaritans Purse.

Don't forget all our students have religion class, daily. They are taught the importance of prayer. They learn about God's love for them. And, they are active in helping those in need.

Yes, there is more to being a Catholic School. This is just a start. No, we aren't a perfect Catholic School. No, we will never be a perfect Catholic School. Yes, we will continue to strive to improve in our Catholicity. Yes, we will continue to be a Catholic School first and an educational institution second.

Thank you for taking the time to read this blog.

God bless you,

Didier Aur, Principal

St. Ann Catholic School

I Love to Work!

Today has been a very good day. After a non-stop work week of putting in 10 to 13 hour days, attending evening meetings, and spending a good portion of Saturday on the soccer field watching several of our St. Ann teams in action; today I got to relax. I enjoyed time with family, attended Mass, went out for lunch after Mass, finished reading The Outsiders (What a great read!), watched the Formula 1 Grand Prix of Singapore and several episodes of Barnwood Builders, cooked dinner and did laundry for the week.

Is this what I do every Sunday? I would say that's pretty close to what most of my Sundays look like. Need to throw a few English Premier League games into the mix.

What does this have to do with St. Ann? Nothing and everything. Since I spend 55-60 hours per week at St. Ann, thought you should know a little bit about what I do on my day off.

What else do I think you should know? Well, I love to work. I work 55-60 per week because I enjoy doing my job. No one requires me to put in that much time at St. Ann. I do so because I receive lots of satisfaction from a job well-done. I derive fulfillment not from helping people be happy, but from helping people be better. If I can help the students become better at everything they do, I receive fulfillment.

Do I do all this so the students can make the honor roll, achieve high test scores, and prepare them for high school and beyond? Well, those are great and admirable things to strive for. But, I do all this work to help the students obtain salvation. In working for their salvation, I hope to develop students who are well-adjusted in life, who will serve those in the community in need, and who make a positive impact on society.

How do I hope to accomplish this? Mainly through example. I want a school full of adults who set the right example of walking the talk of Christianity every day to help make the students better people.

We need to teach our students to be better people. That means teaching responsibility; pushing our students academically; expecting them to have proper behavior; teaching them about kindness, compassion and service; and most of all, developing their faith and love.

The test scores will come. The success in high school and beyond will happen. All of this will take place if we focus on making our students better people by setting the proper examples and holding them accountable. If we all follow the examples Jesus set for us, we will all be better people.


What prompted me to write this particular blog? All of today's readings: Amos, Psalms, 1 Timothy, and Luke. If you didn't hear or read today's readings, CLICK HERE to do so.

Have a great week.

God bless you,
Didier Aur, Principal
St. Ann Catholic School

Donor Luncheon

Thank You Donors!

St. Ann family and friends are very supportive and are an extremely necessary part of our school. Because of the generosity of those who support St. Ann Catholic School, we have been able to hold steady on tuition from last year. We hope to hold steady again for next year. We won't know if this is possible until March of 2020 when we put the budget together. If we can follow the plan we put in place for each department to not go over-budget, we will probably be able to hold where we are on tuition. To me, Catholic education needs to be affordable and available to all who want to be a part of St. Ann.

St. Ann Donor Luncheon

The cost of operating a school goes up every year. So, how can we expect to hold steady on tuition? The answer to that question is that our donors make this possible. Simple. No secret formula. No magic spells. No complicated master plan. Our donors provide the school with gifts to make financial aid possible in order to help families needing tuition assistance. Our donors fulfill teacher wish lists to better help educate our students. Our donors pay for school improvements, renovations, and updates. Our donors purchase classroom furniture. Our donors enable us to improve school security. Our donors help us keep current on technology... You get the picture.

St. Ann Donor Luncheon

Because of what all our donors do for St. Ann, we are able to hold tuition steady. Donors pay for all non-budgeted items the school needs. If we add those items to the budget, the per pupil cost would increase. The per pupil increase would reflect on the tuition. The lower the per pupil cost, the lower the tuition.

We just need to continue to work hard to improve our school (Good things come to those who work hard and never quit.), stay true to our mission statement (Our mission is to provide a Catholic education through faith, service, and love.), stick to our philosophy of transparency (the reason this blog exists), include our families in day-to-day operations, continuously develop an already incredible faculty and staff, and do all this while keeping Christ and our students first.

This past Thursday, St. Ann hosted a donor luncheon. We wanted to bring our donors together to

St. Ann Donor Luncheon

simply say "Thank You" because without you, not sure St. Ann would still be here. Thank you for your faith, service, and love.

Sixty of our donors where able to break away from their busy lives to come tour St. Ann, have lunch together, and allow us the privilege of appreciating their commitment to St. Ann. It was a great day for school. For some of our donors, they had not been in the school building in decades. For others, this was their first time to visit the school.

Thank you parents, grandparents, alumni, parishioners, and friends of St. Ann Catholic School for your support. Thank you for helping to improve the lives of our students. Thank you for helping to keep our tuition affordable. Thank you for helping our teachers educate our students. Thank you for valuing a Catholic education. And, thank you for your love.

If you would like to support the students at St. Ann Catholic Schools, here are some ways you too can help.

Annual Giving

Sister Connie Passing on the Faith Scholarship

Alumni: Click Here to share your information with the school

Wish List Part 1

Wish List Part 2

If you have questions on how you can support St. Ann Catholic School, please contact Angela de Jong at angela.dejong@sascolts.org. Mrs. de Jong is our development director.

God bless you,
Didier Aur, Principal
St. Ann Catholic School

Happy :)

5th Grade Altar Servers with Fr. Bill

I wasn't planning to blog during Easter weekend because there are more important things to do during this weekend, especially to go to church and spend time with family. Between attending services at St. Ann and St. Michael and being with my family, it was a pretty full and wonderful weekend. But, I decided to take part of today to write a blog for this week. I'll take another week off some other time.

I will begin with a realization that struck me

Empty Tabernacle on Holy Thursday

like a jolt when Fr. Ernie left the tabernacle empty at the end of the Holy Thursday Mass. I was actually moved and saddened seeing the empty tabernacle. That's when I realized that when the tabernacle is empty, the tomb is not, and vice-versa; full tabernacle equals an empty tomb. I know for most people it is probably a "duh, of course it is" moment. For me, it was a very moving epiphany. If I got nothing else out of Easter this year, that realization is enough for me in appreciating even more Jesus's sacrifice for us all. Without the resurrection, Christianity would not exist. An empty tabernacle means no resurrection.

That's why the chief priests and elders "gave a large sum of money to the soldiers" to say that "His disciples came by night and stole him while we were asleep." This is from today's Gospel reading. (Matthew 28:8-15) If they convinced everyone that the resurrection did not take place, then there would be no risen Lord.

As for this blog, you might think that the title of this blog, Happy :), is for Happy Easter. I guess it could be since this is the most important day for all of Christendom. So, I do wish everyone a Happy Easter, and that all of you spent time in prayer giving thanks for the resurrection.

As for the title, it is for another Happy. So, I have an assignment for St. Ann families. Actually, this assignment is for anyone reading this blog. When you are looking for something to do as a family, please take the time to watch the  documentary Happy by Roko Belic on Netflix. The reason I suggest watching Happy as a family is because it is a documentary and some of the younger family members might need just a little explaining about what some of the researchers are saying about happiness. In this fast-paced, self-centered, negative leaning, materialistic world of instant gratification we live in; we many times forget the importance of happiness, compassion, caring, gratitude, love, appreciation, while thinking of things bigger than ourselves, and making the world a better place.

This documentary shows the happiest and least happiest people on earth. The producers/researchers of this documentary traveled the globe to learn more about happiness. We could all use a big dose of happiness and a lot less drama and unhappiness. It is easy to get caught up in a world of negativity. In my family, we call it negativitude. This just means having a negative attitude. Need to replace it with lots and lots of positivitude. Or as Jason Mraz says in his song Have It All, "May the best of your todays be the worst of your tomorrows." Happy is definitely worth watching. If you need some happiness, this might just be the kick start you need. It was a great reminder to me to focus more energy to just be happy.

I was able to spend half of Holy Thursday and all of Good Friday at St. Ann all by myself trying my best to make the school better for next year. We are up to date on teacher contracts for the 2019-20 school year. Still have a few more hires to make because we are growing. I have also completed a big chunk of the budget for next year. There are a few things to add but not many.

With the improvements we have made, people recognize the changes being made to make our school a better place for our students. And, these folks believe in our mission and the work we are doing so they are entrusting their children to our care. This means the number of students and families joining our school is on the rise. We have already surpassed this year's enrollment for next year, and it is still April.

No matter how much we've improved, there are a few families who believe the grass is greener somewhere else and some who don't like the fact that I'm asking the teachers to push the students to the next level. That's fine. My job is not to make everyone happy. My job is to make St. Ann the best school possible. We've made lots of improvements and plan to make even more in the future.

I was once told by a great leader that if I and my actions are universally liked, then I'm not pushing hard enough.

With that being said, my goal is to make St. Ann the best school. Another goal is to be the best principal I can possibly be. I don't show up every day to be average. I don't work hard to just get by. I don't work to bring people on board trying to be mediocre. I do all these things in striving to be the best. And, I'm going to do it through hard work, putting together a great team, and most importantly by being HAPPY! For those who are on board and happy, let's kick this pig, together! In other words, let's get started! Let's get started anew every morning in making St. Ann a better school.

Alumni Spotlight:

Ashlen Cook made the Color Guard team at SBA! SBA is starting a marching band and color guard for the first time starting next school year. Also, the SBA Rock and Soul Band went to Atlanta last weekend for a band trip and performed for the students at Hamilton Middle & High School. In addition, their last concert will be this coming Sunday, April 28th, at Neil's Music Room from 4-6 pm. Cover charge is $5. Ashlen is a vocalist for the band and there are four other St. Ann alums in the band- Jack Conway, Wyatt Packard, Matthew Li, and Andrew Mays.

If you have never been to Neil's, it is a treat. Neil Heins is a great guy and a supporter of Catholic education.

God bless you,
Didier Aur, Principal

St. Ann: Our Mission and Vision

St. Ann Catholic School Mission and Vision Statement

Mission: Our mission is to provide a Catholic education through faith, service, and love.

Vision: We envision a thriving school for all children that will provide a premier education in the Catholic tradition.

This message goes out to everyone who is part of the St. Ann community, especially since our accreditation process takes place in less than two months. I want to share these statements so our greater community is informed. I want you to be aware of the mission and vision statement the St. Ann staff created during the first days of in-service last August. The staff came together to examine and update the school's mission and vision statement, which should be reviewed every year. The last time it was updated was in 2013 when the school was going through the last accreditation process.

7th Graders Taking Geography Test

Our goal in developing new statements was to write an honest statement that could be understood, lived out, and memorized by everyone at St. Ann, especially the students. The previous mission statement was inclusive but too long to be memorized, especially by students. The mission statement answers the question of why we exist. Well, we exist to provide a Catholic education through faith, service, and love. The vision statement is future-casting in guiding us to where we hope to be five years from now. As we look to the future, our goal is to improve the quality of education we offer our students to the point we are offering a premier education to all our students at every level. At present, we provide our students a very good education. We aren't premier yet, but I do believe with a lot of hard work, we will get there sooner than later. What I ask from every teacher, staff member, student, family, parishioner, alumni, and supporter is to help get to where we need to be. Let's become a premier Catholic school for all our students together.

Chess Extracurricular Exploration

At this point, the accreditation process is taking most of my time. With so much yet to be done, the accreditation process hangs over all of us. As the head of school, this is the fifth time I've led a school through the accreditation process. This is nothing new to me. Every five years, the accrediting agency changes the accreditation process to keep up with the changing times. The idea of the process is that work is done on a yearly basis to achieve a five-year goal. There are steps that need to be put into place to be able to reach goals.

Scholastic Book Fair

One of the goals from 2013 was to improve math scores on the ITBS by five normal curve equivalent (NCE) points. This is a great goal to achieve. I wasn't at St. Ann five years ago, so I commend those who set that goal. A five NCE point improvement makes sense; one NCE point for every year of a five-year process. The first year, 2014, huge improvements were achieved, only to drop back near the original scores. The five NCE points were not achieved by any grade after five years. These scores are from the ITBS, which is administered late April or early May. The other two goals dealt with increasing the amount of technology used in classrooms and in classroom instruction.

Scholastic Book Fair

The goals we are setting for this new accreditation process will not be five-year goals but one-year goals. After accomplishing these three goals, we will set three more goals for the following year. If we achieve three goals on a consistent basis, our test scores will improve; everything will improve. In the words of Fr. Ernie, "Improve the quality of the school." That's what we are doing. Sustainable improvement cannot happen over night and cannot be done in a vacuum. Improvement is going to take time, and is going to take us working together.

Library Volunteers

St. Ann Improvement Goals:

1. St. Ann needs to add a school counselor to the staff. The hope is that the school counselor will also be qualified to work as the school’s assistant principal.

2.  St. Ann would like to become a one-to-one school with iPads for grades 2-4. We are already one-to-one in grades 5-8.

3.  St. Ann would like to develop more individualized lessons geared toward the individual students to better serve them.  This is where a counselor and assistant principal would help, especially in breaking down the data and helping teachers create more individualized lesson plans.

Kindergarten Free Play

All the Catholic Schools of this diocese minus the Jubilee Schools are going through the AdvancED accreditation process together. The visiting AdvancED team will be here April 1st & 2nd to meet with all the school leaders. One of their meetings is with parents from all the schools. Lori Locke and Jimmy Crews will be the parents representing St. Ann.

Members of AdvancED School Improvement Plan committee are: Didier Aur (principal), Angela de Jong (development director), Annmarie Ghio (teacher), Teresa Ferrante (teacher), Mike Green (technology coordinator), Susan Hunt (parish administrator), Lori Locke (Home & School president), Liz Wehmeyer (parent and Apple certified teacher), and Fr. William Parham (associate pastor).

Thank you to everyone who completed a teacher, staff, parent, or student survey last fall. These surveys have come in handy in developing goals for the school. We hope to use annual surveys to keep the improvement process going.

Support St. Ann

If you have a little time, please say some prayers for a successful accreditation process. We need and appreciate those prayers.

God bless you,
Didier Aur, Principal
St. Ann Catholic School

Catholic Schools Week: A Week of Celebration

Pajamas for Catholic Charities

I write my blog on Sunday evenings, and today being Super Bowl Sunday, I did the same thing today as I do every Super Bowl Sunday, I watched the last two minutes of the game. I do that every year, just the last two minutes. Evidently, that's about all I needed to watch this year. Congratulations to the New England Patriots and the Patriot fans out there.  Super Bowl Champions times VI!

Student Trivia Contest

This has been a great Catholic Schools Week for St. Ann filled with days of celebration. It started off with the school choir singing at Mass, and an extremely well attended St. Ann Preview Day last Sunday. Monday was Pajama Day. You wore your pajamas to school if you donated a new pair of pajamas to Catholic Charities. Well, Catholic Charities received a car load of pajamas to give to children needing pajamas to keep warm at night. Tuesday, we wore our favorite sports team jerseys. Cannot believe how many Steelers fans we have. I wore my São Paulo

My São Paulo Soccer Jersey!
But I'm Playing Volleyball.

Futebol Clube soccer jersey. São Paulo is my favorite soccer team from my hometown in Brazil. Yes Battle Boys, they are much better than Chelsea. And yes, Tottenham is also better than Chelsea. Just saying. Tuesday was also the Staff/Student Volleyball Game. The students put up a good fight, but they were no match for the likes of Deborah Harty, Tracy Angotti, Billy Gage, James Newell and Ryan Cooper. Just in case you didn't hear, Deborah Harty was voted the game's MVP for her total court domination, Wednesday was  Pep Rally Day and Red, White, and Blue Day. Everyone came to school dressed in Red, White, and Blue. USA! USA! Thursday was Career Day and Grandparents Day. This was probably the best day because of all the Grandparents who attended

7th Grade Student Ambassadors

Mass with their grandchild. There are few things in life as wonderful and special as a grandparent/grandchild relationship. Friday was School Spirit Day, Faculty Appreciate Day, and the Student Trivia Contest. As you can see, it was an action packed week for which I'm still trying to recover. Now, I'm hoping for a few days of nothing but normal school days just to try to get caught up. I'm adding a lot of Catholic Schools Week pictures to this blog.

Winning Volleyball Team!

Now, for all the updates, and we have lots of them.

Volunteer Tutors: We have a whole bunch of wonderful people volunteering to tutor our students who need extra help. Now, we have a group of students from CBHS and SBA who want to perform their service hours tutoring our students after school. What better way to use service hours than by helping other students: Students Helping Students! Teresa Ferrante and Annmarie Ghio are in charge of scheduling the tutors with the St. Ann students. We are in constant need of volunteers. So, let us know if you are willing and able to help.

4th Grade PJ Day

I have asked Sally Fillion and Tracy Angotti to put together a St. Ann Bowling Team. They have followed through on this request, and they formed a St. Ann team with 17 students having signed up! I think more students will sign up as word spreads about the team. I encouraged forming a bowling team because bowling is a lifetime sport. I believe lifetime sports are very important. I play a lifetime sport in soccer. I'm 57 and still play. Not very well nor very fast, but my friends and I still play.

3rd Grade PJ Day

The next activity I want our students to participate in is in skeet and trap shooting. I want to form a St. Ann Shot Gun Team. The high schools have them. This would help our students make their high school shot gun team. The problem is, we need some coaches to teach our students. I might have to get the Bartlett Police Department involved somehow. Hey Captain Sones, I need your help on this one.

The Chess Club is coming together nicely. The Club now has nine members! My hope is that the Chess Club will also continue to grow as students learn more about Chess. I might be the worse chess player in the world, so it would be best if I just stay away when they are playing.

Band at Pep Rally

The next Extracurricular Exploration classes will start in a couple of weeks. We've come up with new EEs with the first being a tutoring EE. It is not for students who need to be tutored. It is for our middle school students who would like to help tutor the younger students at St. Ann. This is another form of Students Helping Students! We are also considering an IXL/Khan Academy EE for students who would like the opportunity to advance their studies. We have academic EEs, athletic EEs, and fine arts EEs. The middle school students are getting a lot of choices in doing different things outside of their regular class time.

One of Our Trivia Teams

I think we need a Hunger Games EE. No, we are not going to hunt each other down in the Arena developed by the Gamemakers. This would be a Hunger Games Book Club. Or, we could have a Harry Potter Book Club. Quidditch anyone? Accio! If you've read Harry Potter, this would make sense.

We are going to have a Gardening EE for the next two EE sessions. Mr. Gage will lead this EE. If you are interested in helping with the Gardening EE, please contact the school office. We sure could use some master gardeners or just some regular green thumb type people.

Students at the Pep Rally

We have some great St. Ann folks who have stepped up to donate the $2,098 we need for the security cameras. I plan to get together with Susan Hunt to get the project moving forward. Another item I want to add to the security system is speakers in the hallways. The intercom messages cannot be heard in the hallway. If there is an emergency, students and staff in the hallways need to know what's going on. When we asked for the speaker donations for the classrooms, we received more speakers than we needed. Now, we can use those speakers in the hallways (I hope). We will have to wire them to the existing audio system. I'm then going to buy an Amazon Echo, and have Alexa play classical music throughout the whole school all day long. I'm just kidding. Maybe. Once the cameras are in, the door locks will be next.

Student/Staff Volleyball Game

St. Ann Trivia Night is coming up on Saturday, March 2nd. I hope to have a room full of St. Ann supporters answering all kinds of crazy questions. Now that Catholic Schools Week is over, I'm going to focus on maxing out our trivia night. The Aur Family is entering a team. Our goal is not to finish last. We don't have very high expectations. We just want to support St. Ann and have fun.

If you would like to sponsor trivia night, please get in touch with me for sponsorship opportunities. All proceeds go to the Sr. Connie Scholarship Fund. This scholarship fund goes to St. Ann parishioners who need financial assistance to attend the school. This is a great way to make the school more affordable for families in our parish.

Click To Support St. Ann

Hey St. Ann alumni! We need you. Please put a team together for trivia night, and don't forget to attend our Fat Tuesday Alumni Party on Tuesday, March 5th. Yes, it is a weeknight. Come out anyway. St. Ann is a great place, and we want you to be a part of it.

God bless you,
Didier Aur, Principal
St. Ann Catholic School