In just three short days, we will be closing the chapter on the 2016/2017 school year.  As I sit here preparing to celebrate our teacher volunteers this Sunday and award our spectacular students the following Sunday, I can truly say I am overcome with emotion.

Last August, on some of the hottest days of summer, several dedicated parishioners spent weeks scrubbing, painting, hammering, hauling and preparing for our 2016/2017 school year.  Several nights were spent gathering in the conference room poring over ideas, survey results and countless curriculums (no really….countless).  We planned committees, dissected small details and dug in–finalizing the kick off of the school year.  No detail was left unplanned and it truly did “take a village”.  We had two simple goals: more teachers, higher attendance.

Just three days shy of our final day, I am so unbelievably proud to say…mission accomplished!  We had more than THIRTY FIVE teacher volunteers this year (and even had two teachers per classroom).  Our attendance on a few weeks hit over 40 and averaged in the low thirties.  Some days our high school room was ‘standing room only’.

I am so proud of the work done by our committee members Elizabeth Nelson, Pat Braidwood, Jen Handley, Lori Bathurst, Dana Szilier, Jack Daugherty and Chris Southwick and the incredible generosity of all our teacher volunteers!  And I am so very thankful for my Sunday School partner, Jenn Harrington.

I hope you all join us this Sunday for a wonderful tribute to our teachers and next Sunday as we recognize our students.

I’m looking forward to the 2017/2018 school year!

-Amanda