Written by Michael Swan, The Catholic Register, with additional reporting by Carolyn Girard and Sheila Dabu
Dear Readers,
In Ontario’s Catholic schools students, teachers, trustees, parents and administrators walk by faith, not by fear. The gallery of excellence on the following pages is testament to what faith can do with us, among us and for us.
There is a spectre of fear hovering over our history. Before Confederation immigrant Catholics knew the Anglican-controlled school system was a mechanism for their assimilation by the Protestant establishment. They knew very well the establishment held Catholic newcomers in contempt. At Confederation the danger of assimilation was real enough for Catholics to fight a political battle to ensure their education rights in the basic law of the new country.
As Catholic education rights were maliciously and illegally undercut after the First World War, Catholics relied on a secret weapon — religious sisters and brothers who would give their lives to ensure a Catholic education and to preserve the culture and spirituality which sustains the church. As high school became the new standard for a basic education after the Second World War, Catholic parents made financial sacrifices to give their children the necessary education in a Catholic context.
Winning the political and legal battle for full funding in 1984 and for more equal funding in 1998 hasn’t erased the spectre of fear. Today, Catholics worry about the bureaucratization of Catholic education, the focus on testing and measurement at the expense of free enquiry and intellectual growth, a funding formula that leaves boards in a financial straight jacket, falling enrolments everywhere but the suburbs surrounding Toronto and the failures of leadership which have become an embarrassment to us all.
Excellence is not founded in fear. Nor is it the product of worry. Examine especially the young faces in these pages. The excellence they have achieved is founded in faith, hope, love and charity.
Carr cares Fr. Henry Carr Catholic Secondary School Student Council.
School founded by Basilian Fathers in 1974.
New Building opens 2008.
The kids at Carr go to school smack dab in the middle of Doomstown — the Jamestown neighbourhood of Toronto where a police raid in 2006 swept up 106 members of the Jamestown Crew. This neighbourhood was the setting for the 2006 made-for-TV movie Doomstown about drug trafficking and dim prospects in tightly packed public housing projects that dominate the area.
Members of the Father Henry Carr Secondary School student council have to fight the reputation and the reality of their neighbourhood. They’re sick of hearing about the violence, the guns, the gangs and the poverty.
“There’s always the negative stigma,” said Grade 12 student Jessica Okhonmina.
Students are proud of their basketball team, but they know their school produces excellence of all kinds — not just athletic. About 150 of Carr’s 820 students are enrolled in the Advanced Placement program that awards them university credits upon graduation from high school and success in the AP exam.
The student council makes it its business to ensure the success of everybody at the school, starting as soon as a new kid walks in the door at the beginning of Grade 9. The student mentorship program has older students checking in on the Grade 9s, making sure they’re part of the school community and that they’re keeping up with their studies. They teach the Grade 9 students to set goals and measure their progress.
When you come from a neighbourhood called Doomstown, it’s important to have people telling you that you can and should set goals — and that you can achieve them, said Grade 12 student Silvana Miller.
“We show them that we care,” said Miller.
The official motto of the school is Dominus ut Videam (Let us see the Lord), but the unofficial motto is “Carr cares.”
Faith in service Deidre Pereira, chaplaincy leader at St. Joseph Secondary School in Mississauga since 1999. Formerly a science teacher.
Realizing that not all 1,800 students at St. Joseph’s were going to get involved in a faith-based club, Deidre Pereira, 38, decided to help them discover how to incorporate their faith with their interests through outreach, peace initiatives and social justice opportunities.
After only a few years of working with students and other staff, more than half of the 50 student clubs are now reaching out to the community in some way.
Members of a Latin dance club volunteer to teach seniors at a nearby home how to dance. Sports teams hold special competitions to raise money for local food and gift outreaches at Thanksgiving and Christmas. The “Writers Unblocked” club published a book of poetry and donated it to pediatric wing of the Credit Valley Hospital. The list goes on.
“Really, number one for me is prayer and how to serve the needs of a large community,” Pereira said.
“Young people have a desire to serve and we need to encourage them to live their faith every day.”
Taking advantage of God's plan for him Mangisto Arop, 18, Grade 12, St. Mary’s Catholic High School, Hamilton, Ont.
Born in Sudan, the young basketball star and his family fled to refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya because of the civil war. He came to Canada in 2000 with his mother, Angelina, and four brothers.
In 2008-2009, he is ranked as the top male high school player in Canada. He was a member of the junior national team that took the bronze medal at FIBA Americas U18 Championship and is currently training with Canada Basketball’s National Elite Development Academy. He has earned a scholarship at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington, and hopes to play in the NBA.
On his faith, Arop says, “Things happen for a reason. God has plans for us.”
He also has some advice for kids.
“The big thing is believing in yourself and staying motivated because there are times when you’re not going to be good at certain things or (you) hit rock bottom, but don’t give up. Keep working hard. There’s always going to be a way to get it done and just keep praying.”
Parents key in faith formation Michelle Griepsma, 45, parent in the Peterborough, Victoria, Northumberland and Clarington Catholic District School Board
The family service counsellor has volunteered with the local school and parish council since the mid-1990s and received a Recognition of Personal Accomplishment for volunteer service from her local MP.
Griepsma enrolled her four children back into public Catholic schools after a brief stint in private Catholic schools. A convert to Catholicism, Griepsma says she initially had a different perception of what the Catholic school system was responsible for in teaching her children about the catechism. But she said she soon realized the important role that parental responsibility has in the faith formation of children.
“I think it’s really important to have Catholic education because it’s where the whole person can be educated, the spiritual needs of the person are met, and God is acknowledged,” she said.
“I need (my kids) to see that it is a part of life. That it’s not just confined to Sundays. That our faith is integrated in everything that we do all day long.”
Giving back to his communityMichael George, Grade 8 teacher at St. Josephine Bakhita Catholic School, Brampton.
Why he does it: “My heart’s here,” George said. He knows he is one of the increasingly rare men teaching in the elementary schools. “You realize that the most impact you can have with them is when they’re young.”
George grew up in a tough neighbourhood in Malton, where not a lot of his peers went on to post-secondary education, and not a few of them wound up known to police.
“I could have simply made the same decisions,” he tells his students. Instead, he decided black kids and immigrant kids needed to see a man of colour in their classrooms. George decided to be a visible minority who makes a visible impact in the community through education.