Happy New Year! It was a great vacation, but it is nice to be back. We hope your vacation was enjoyable, too. On these cold mornings, it is important that your child has a healthy breakfast to get a good start to the day and a warm jacket to wear to school. While the building is nice and warm, it gets quite chilly when they go outside at recess time.
This past Monday marked the Feast of the Epiphany. Epiphany is traditionally celebrated the 12th day after Christmas. The term epiphanymeans to show or to reveal. When the Wise Men, who brought the gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to Jesus they were the first to acknowledge Jesus as King and so were the first to show or reveal Jesus to a wider world as the incarnate Christ. Today, the day is now observed as a time of focusing on the mission of the church in reaching others byshowing Jesus as the Savior of all people.
The Parents’ Club have their monthly meeting tomorrow night, Thursday, January 9th in Carroll Hall. Tomorrow’s meeting will begin with social hour at 6:45pm. See you there!
SANDWICHES-FOR-THE-NEEDY: Our first collection for the new year is this Friday, January 10th. Thank you again to the 1st and 2nd graders who will take the lead. We encourage ALL families to provide an extra sandwich for this first collection of the year. Some of our older students will once again work with residents from Alma Via on Friday to make at least 50 additional sandwiches to add to this collection. Please remember that in order to facilitate the distribution of sandwiches, we have been asked to provide just one type of sandwich: turkey on sliced white or brown bread.
Next Monday, January 13th, Olive the storyteller will be here for the kindergarten through third grade students. Come and enjoy some magical tales in Carroll Hall at 8:30 and 9:30.
1:1 IPAD PROGRAM: On Monday, we kicked off our 1:1 iPad program for our 6th, 7th and 8th graders. Both students and teachers were excited to embark on this fantastic opportunity. Today, all 6th, 7th and 8th graders are receiving the iPad Student Account Permission Form and 1:1 iPad Student Responsibilities and Agreement that will need to be signed and returned to their classroom teacher no later than Wednesday, January 15th. Please remind your child to be extra vigilant in leaving their backpacks unattended during practices and after school to ensure that none of these valuable devices go missing.
USF DIGITAL MEDIA AND LEARNING: We are very excited to be asked once again to participate in a unique partnership with theUniversity of San Francisco. Our students will work in collaboration with USF graduate students in an exciting course entitled, Digital Media and Learning. This is our seventh year participating in this program and is open to all 7th and 8th grade students. Because of class size restrictions there are only eight spots open to STM students. The sessions will take place on Thursday afternoons between 4:30 and 6:00pm at the School of Education at USF, 2350 Turk Boulevard. The first session will begin on Thursday, February 13th and will continue for seven weeks. If you are interested in having your child participate, please click here for more information and to review the flyer.
CIOPPINO: Please mark your calendars for Saturday, February 22nd. The evening includes appetizers, antipasto, salad, garlic bread, cioppino (or chicken if you prefer), dessert, balloon prizes and a fabulous auction. Babysitting is also available on site! The committees in charge are busy looking for raffle and silent auction items to use as part of this event. Many such items are received through the generosity of our parent community. Do you have items at home that you cannot use? Are you always thrilled by all your Christmas gifts? Do you really need anotherchia pet? Well, one person’s garbage is another person’s treasure. Send us your unwanted/unneeded gifts. We’ll turn those lumps of coal into diamonds! The committee is now accepting donations of all kinds. Please drop all donations to the school office.
The next Cioppino meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, January 21st. Anyone interested in helping with the event are invited to attend the meeting at 7:00 in Carroll Hall.
NATIONAL CATHOLIC SCHOOLS WEEK: This runs from January 26ththrough February 1st. Please mark your calendars for our Family Mass, Open House, Book Faire, and other exciting events on Sunday, January 26th. The schedule of activities for National Catholic Schools Week is included in your envelope today and will be available on our website shortly. Again this year we will be having a special day where we invite grandparents and other special guests to spend some of the day with the children. Pencil in Thursday, January 30th for this special day. Invitations for this Grandparents lunch are in your envelopes today. To help celebrate our grandparents and other special guests in the lives of our children, all students and their adult guests will receive a free lunch that day! We are looking for parent volunteers to help prepare this lunch. If you are available, please contact the office as soon as possible.
SPELL-A-THON: Children have been doing a great job getting sponsors for the spell-a-thon over the past few weeks. Keep it up! Check out the flyer in today’s envelope for important upcoming dates.
PAYMENTS DUE: A reminder that the January payment is now due for those of you on the monthly tuition payment plan. If you have not yet paid your Capital Improvement fee of $350 per family, which was due last month, please submit it to the office as soon as possible. Extended Care billing notices for the month of December are in your envelopes today.
KINDERGARTEN APPLICATIONS: We are happy to announce that we have received a large number of applications for our 2014-2015 kindergarten class. Please note that in accordance with California State law children must be 5 years of age on or before September 1st in order for them to attend kindergarten in the fall. As a reminder, if you currently have a child in Utopia or a sibling who wishes to apply for kindergarten and have not completed the application, please do so as soon as possible. We will begin processing kindergarten applications and scheduling screening appointments by mid-January.
Thank you for all your ongoing generous support.
Sincerely,
Marie Fitzpatrick
Principal
