Dear Students, Alumni, Parents, & Friends of St. Francis,
We hope you more than survived the Thanksgiving Holiday and that you spent quality time with family and friends. The birth of our Lord is a special time of year for all Christians, but for Salesians, it is even more sacred, as St. John Bosco had a special devotion to Mary. Bosco felt a deep kinship with Jesus in that he always went to help the poor and the young first. I hope you and your family will make time to provide service to your local communities this Christmas holiday season, especially to the poor and the young. We are all so blessed, and we all have so much to be grateful for. If you have pictures of you and your family helping out in the community, please share them with Ms. Nicole Dewig ([email protected]) so we can share them on social media and recognize your children for being young men and women of character and service.
As we prepare for Christmas, we also prepare for semester exams. Ms. Eagleson has detailed information about this, so if you print any part of this newsletter…print her dates/times. Early Action seniors have been wearing their college sweatshirts, and all seniors are reveling in the joy (and anxiety) that this is their last fall semester of high school. For all four grade-levels, after a lengthy and relaxing Thanksgiving break, it is a chance to improve YOU in all areas – spiritually, emotionally, physically, artistically, and intellectually. Be the best YOU…YOU can be!
We mailed the Annual Fund (St. Francis Fund) brochure in November and just celebrated our first foray into the National Giving Day (#GivingTuesday) with our first 24-hour campaign of the year. We aimed to double the goal from last year by meeting or exceeding 96 gifts. Not only did we exceed our goal, but we also increased giving by 37% using our online platform!
Thank you to our alumni, parents, current students, staff, and Board of Directors who gave. We are still pushing to exceed our total annual fund giving from last year and we still need your help. Donate up through December 31, 2019, to fully realize the tax benefits while ensuring that St. Francis High School is accessible and affordable for all qualified and committed students.
Please find it in your heart to donate. Donating to the annual fund is separate from the Burgundy & Gray and Golf Tournament, and all are necessary! My wife and I are humble educators, but we annually attend B&G and purchase many silent auction items and desserts. We also give to the annual fund twice a month and donated 4 times for the #GivingTuesday campaign. Creating a culture of giving is important to our family and is an important part of our Catholic values. We hope you and your family can find that same gratitude in your hearts to generously give and embrace this great opportunity to be role models for the young people in our lives.
If your child is in leadership, campus ministry, sports, the arts, and/or clubs, then we need your help to bridge the gap between what we charge for tuition versus the actual cost of educating each student. The difference is $1,334 per student. Every donation counts – from $20 to $20,000, it all makes a huge difference. Even if you rely on tuition assistance, our goal is 100% participation from our families. This year we will, again, use our SFPA Grade Level Representatives to facilitate each grade level’s participation in the online and/or direct mail Annual Appeal. The class with the highest percentage of families participating will get a free lunch and free dress day on April 20th, 2020 (the first Monday after Easter break). I hope to improve our own internal giving; to this date, we have not had more than 38% parent giving by grade level. The national average is significantly higher, and our Board of Directors have challenged us to improve this percentage.
Also, in the spirit of Christmas and celebration, I want to thank the students who have been accepting my monthly invitations to participate in Lunch with the President. This event brings in 2 students from each grade level to share their “glows and grows” for the school; it gives them a voice in the school and gives me a climate check on important teenage ideas and issues for them. Though we missed our lunch opportunity in November, we will host again this December.
Another opportunity we have had to use the voices of our current and alumni students, current and alumni parents, local community members, and staff is the CEPC (Council for the Educative Pastoral Community). This group audits our Salesianity in our school and community and identifies solutions to meet the needs of our young people. We will have had 2 meetings, by the time this newsletter goes out, where members interviewed adults and young people in our school and local communities to see what more we can do as a Salesian high school. This group has already impacted this year’s school community as we plan for our next meeting and what more we can do. When the plan is finished, we will share it with all of you. Again, this is another way our students have a voice and direct impact on their school and surrounding communities. Thank you to all of the students, parents, and staff who took the surveys to get ready for our Self-Assessment. There was a very high level of participation, and I will share the results of the surveys, as well as our December Salesian School Site Visit, next month.
Finally, I want to reiterate the value of Friday Night Bingo and why we need all freshmen families as well as all families on merit-based or need-based tuition assistance to work their assigned days. Bingo is the only significant fundraiser held outside of school, where you are not expected to donate money. It involves our entire community – including the parish and local towns – and it takes all of us working it to make it successful. Friday Night Bingo also helps keep tuition costs affordable, allows us to keep the school new and clean, and in the end, assists with need-based and merit-based assistance. If you are not there on your assigned shift, we will not have enough people to service the bingo patrons, sell, and clean up – then, another parent has to do his/her work and yours. This work is a chance to build the SF community and help in the three above - mentioned areas that are critical for this school to thrive. Embrace our community; embrace the Friday Night Bingo experience; and, don’t leave your fellow parents covering for you. It takes all of us working together to make this enterprise a successful part of the SF High School experience.
We hope to see all of you on Saturday, December 21, 2019, for the alumni basketball games and all-alumni mixer. Women play at 5:30 PM and men at 7 PM. There is a $5 entrance charge for all guests/participants. Food and drink will be provided for alumni and their families after the men’s game.
Yours in Christ,
Mr. Pat Lee
President and Principal