June STUDENT TRUSTEE REPORT St. Patrick s Catholic High School Home of the Fighting Irish By Jack Soeder This month marks the end of another beautiful year of Catholic education at St. Patrick s. It has consisted of a lot of learning, but not just of knowledge of books and numbers, but knowledge of the beauty of God s love. There has also been a lot of giving throughout the year, so much giving that it s near impossible to remember every one uniquely. But from Link Crew, to Irish Miracle to Muskoka Woods, St. Patrick s has really taken the book, The Giving Tree to heart this year. Lastly, throughout the giving and learning, there has also been a lot of growing. It s almost as if every student has felt themselves grow into a bigger and better person through their actions, or merely emulating others actions. However, even if not every student has grown or learned or gave; there is always opportunity to do it next year at St. Patrick s.
Palooza Student council put in their last hurrah with the organization of yet another amazing Palooza. For those who are unaware, Palooza is a Fun Day in which there are shortened classes with students being able to pay five dollars to go on some inflatables and enjoy the weather for a really good cause. Perhaps my favourite memory of the day was watching the PEOPEL program students enjoy all the inflatables with such passion, energy and enthusiasm. It just put a smile on everyone s face. Another highlight of the day, which came along with the Palooza was Irish Live. Irish Live was the musical acts of St. Pat s students showing off their skills throughout the day. I ve said it before but it s always relevant, the amount of talent in our school is amazing and it s just right that it should be shown off; and any chance that that can happen is amazing. Another cool part about Irish Live was the alumni, now off from college and university, who came back to play and have a good time. While so many students at different schools can t wait to leave their school and never come back, we have the opposite issue. They won t leave! But all kidding aside, it s amazing to see our alumni come back and still have an impact on our community and remain a part of the family. Overall, the day was an amazing success with over 3000 dollars going to the Dan Does it For Sarnia campaign. This campaign is run by Dan Edwards, a former St. Chris graduate who was paralyzed in an accident many years ago. Yet when that happened, the entire community rallied behind him, now he wants to give back to the community and we are very thankful to be a part of that as the Irish Community. A huge thanks goes out to student council for making this happen!
The Activities Banquet Our annual activities banquet was held on June 9 th at the Holiday Inn. There were literally over two hundred people there!! If that doesn t say something about how involved our students are I don t know what will! We could barely fit in the conference room! It was amazing first of all to see all the award winners who don t exactly flaunt their abilities get recognized for their skill and achievement. As well, this year is the first year in which it wasn t just mostly sports that were recognized. There were just as many tech team and art club awards than athletic awards and that really shows how our diversified our school has become. We accept and appreciate all the different talents people can have. As well, the highlight of the night was the giving out of the most prestigious of awards. Awards which require serious dedication and commitment to St. Patrick s. The Varsity Award (Completed 16 activities), The Principal s Award (Varsity Award, plus student council involvement, religious involvement, and honours society) and the Collin Hood Award (Best boy and girl athlete) all require hundreds or more likely thousands of hours of hard work so congratulations to those winners! Also a huge thank you goes out to the teachers who volunteer countless hours to make sure that we are able to have these clubs and activities. It really means so much to all of us! Also another huge thank you goes out to Mrs. Kirchmair for being our Master of Ceremonies and having some fun with Olympic Trivia. As well, another thank you goes out to Mrs. Wagner who organized the whole thing and does so much unseen work and is always so kind. She literally got a standing ovation at the ceremony which was amazing!
Graduation It s kind of funny, when our schools amalgamated in grade ten, everyone imagined there would be a stark contrast and divide between the St. Chris kids and the St. Pat s kid s for the rest of our high school education. Well on June 12th both of these groups of people graduated from one school, and that prediction could not be more wrong. And as every student walked across the stage, I don t think it would have been possible to distinguish who went where in grade nine. And as Joe Mckinnon our Valedictorian stated, The other school wasn t a scary kid from across town, but more like a long lost twin. You could just tell how much of a family we are because every student who walked across the stage got the same applause from their friends. Everyone is loved, everyone has a place and that s beautiful. And if you ever fall, you will always have someone who will offer a helping hand. This was shown again by our valedictorian. At the beginning of his speech he was visibly quite nervous and started to stumble a little bit. Our grade noticed this, and instead of judging at all we responded by cheering as loud as we possibly could and letting him know we love him no matter what. But overall it was a beautiful ceremony with many speeches that really summed up what it means to graduate from St. Patrick s. They all saw everything from a little bit different, but equally beautiful viewpoint. As well, it was great to have the band to provide some beautiful music. However, perhaps the highlight was the graduation video created by Selena Tote, Olivia Rodenhuis, Rachel Jackson and Jhay Turner. It really captured the amazing friendship dynamics throughout the grade and tried to give every student the spotlight even if it was just for a couple seconds. Congratulations to all graduates and good luck in the future!
The Shamrock Showdown It never ceases to amaze me the power of few likeminded individuals. John Fazio and Zion Webb wanted to raise money for Diabetes. So they put in countless hours going to dozens of meeting with Mr. Cicchelli for months on end to organize a dodgeball tournament to raise some money. They assembled a support team of teachers and staff in the building but most of the work was theirs. They organized forms, payment, advertising, and even the tournament itself. And let me tell you, the shamrock showdown was a roaring success, it brought fourteen teams together for a week long of fun after school. Culminating in the semis and finals in front of the school on Friday June 10 th. There was even a teacher and a chaplaincy team! Although it was intended to be a fun, laid back experience that was not the case. As anyone who s ever played dodgeball knows it turns very competitive very quickly. But it was all in good fun as the benchwarmers ended winning with a surprise victory after only coming through as a wildcard! But the amazing thing is it raised over 5000 dollars and that s amazing. Hopefully this becomes an annual thing because it was just so fun and raised so much money for an amazing cause! Thanks boys for all your great work!
Trivia Night Students were given the opportunity to participate in another annual trivia night which is just a great night. Everyone dressed up in some awesome and very creative costumes and themes! There was so much effort put in to the costumes it almost seemed as if the trivia took a backseat. Just kidding of course but everyone had a ton of fun with the opportunity to win some awesome prizes generously donated from many local businesses! Thanks to everyone involved in the organization of this fun night! imatter St. Patrick s cares a ton about mental health. This is shown extensively by the kids help phone concerts and many speakers which promote the idea of mental health. But all of that stuff, it comes from the outside. They may mean well and certainly provide a serious positive impact. But it could never compare to something run by St. Pat s students, for St. Pat s students. And that is where imatter comes in, it s a peer mentorship program run by senior students where they go and talk to all the grade nines about mental health. Their primary goal is to stomp out the stigma surrounding mental health and make kids aware of the various resources in our school that can be utilized if need be. They also have recent St. Chris graduate, Kyle Mcvitie come in and speak about his journey with mental illness. It s just great to see so many people who are so passionate about this topic because it is a real concern and a real danger. But having Mrs. Ducharme and a team like this really works a lot to make a real difference in counteracting that danger. A huge thank you goes out to Mrs. Whitcombe for putting all of it together it would never ever happen without her and she makes a huge difference in our school!