Good morning you A-W-E-S-O-M-E Hurricanes!
Please find attached, our Hurricane ‘WEEKLY’ Newsletter for November 13th - 17th, 2023.
A very heartfelt thank you to Mr. Kelly, Mrs. Karl and Mrs. Picanco for inspiring our Grade 7 students to facilitate our Remembrance Day Ceremony yesterday for our entire school community. The assembly was very reverent and reflective and judging from the silence of the 550 staff, students and guests in attendance, – it was clearly evident to see that everyone understood the significance.
In education, there are 3 things that we attempt to pass on to our young people. #1 KNOWLEDGE, #2 SKILLS and #3 VALUES. Many would argue that #3 is the most important and admittedly often the hardest to instill. On that note, most if not all of our young people and certainly even a majority of the adults, have not had personal experiences with war and conflict. So how do you really help someone to connect to something, that they have no personal experience with? Other examples of these, which maybe our grandparents have experienced, are things like starvation, poverty, racisim or disease. Despite the inherent challenges to help people truly “understand and empathize” with things in our world they have no experience with, Catholic educators do a really good job helping our young people learn these important values. At the end of the day, we believe knowledge and skills are important and help people get to careers and pathways, however, value-based education whether it’s our core focus on faith, lessons supporting mental well-being like Umbrella Project, diversity training with our unLEARN program, focussing on Catholic Graduate Expectations and so on – ARE CRITICAL and all contribute to helping our children BECOME GOOD HUMAN BEINGS and “active, collaborative, compassionate citizens in our world, and throughout their lives.
With all that said, please take the time today and always, to “REMEMBER” to discuss, teach and practice those values with our young people, especially today with Remembrance Day. Supporting our young people with opportunities to practice “gratitude, conflict-resolution and citizenship” is arguably the most important teaching and the greatest gift we can give them.
On behalf of the entire Hurricane Community, T-H-A-N-K Y-O-U to everyone or anyone who has ever given, dedicated and sacrificed their life to service-for-others, so that others may life more peacefully, safely, healthy, respectfully and happily. “Lest we forget” and we are forever grateful.
Ralph Waldo Emmerson put it best when he said, “what lies behind you and in front of you pales in comparison, to what lies inside of you.” We’ve been teaching our kids to have a HEART-OF-A-HURRICANE! This means that no matter what storm surrounds us, we need to continue using those “values, strengths and gifts of our faith” God gave us, and teachers and parents guide us to use - to BE KIND, to BE THE CHANGE that our world needs.
So keep taking care of yourselves and each other Hurricanes... Have a nice weekend! Thank you for your ongoing and unconditional support – it is felt! And thank you one again to our veterans and all those who serve our country in the quest and eternal hope for peace and freedom. H.T. R-E-M-E-M-B-E-R-S!