Category: General

St. Bernard School held its much-anticipated annual pet blessing event on October 4, where students and their pets gathered on the school grounds for a celebration in honor of St. Francis. This tradition, which has been a beloved part of the school for many years, brings together the school community to celebrate the bond between humans and their furry, feathered, and finned friends.

The event was a resounding success. “It was so cool to see students and their pets covering the field waiting to receive a special blessing from Deacon Bernie,” said Jack, one of the 8th-grade students. Emma, a second-grader, said, “I had to leave my dog at home, so I brought a stuffed animal to get blessed. My friend brought one, too!” Other students who were unable to bring their pets to school brought photos to be blessed with holy water.

At the start of the event, the older students buddied up with younger students and were encouraged to interact with the animals brought by parents and special friends. Dogs, cats, bunnies, birds, fish, and bearded dragons were just some of the animals on display. It was heartwarming to see the joy on the faces of the students as they cuddled and played with the animals.

The school choir, Hillside Harmonics, began the event by opening the celebration with a song led by our school’s talented choir director, Ms. Finke. They sang the ever-so-popular “A Place in the Choir” which made all of the children giggle. The song is definitely a crowd-pleaser and had everyone singing and dancing along. Following the music, Principal David Gusloff read an opening prayer to allow for pause and reflection. Harper and Giselle, two 8th-grade students, read the first reading and petitions before hearing the gospel and homily from Father Adam.

The event concluded with Deacon Bernie offering a final blessing for all the pets, reminding everyone of the importance of cherishing and respecting the animals we share our lives with. Students and their pets left with a sense of unity and an even deeper appreciation for the animals that bring joy and comfort into their lives.

Ms. Brittany Dudzik, assistant principal at St. Bernard, stated, “The annual pet blessing not only brings our community together but also reminds us of the unique and cherished relationships we share with our pets. It’s a wonderful way to teach our students the values of love, compassion, and respect for all living creatures. We are honored to be able to share in this feast with our family members each and every year.”

The annual pet blessing event at St. Bernard School remains a treasured tradition each year. You are encouraged to check out the photos from this event on the school’s social media pages. You can follow the school on Facebook at St. Bernard School or on Instagram @stbernardgb.

St. Bernard Catholic School (PK3-8) is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school with open enrollment serving preschool students and elementary students from Kindergarten through 8th grade. St. Bernard provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

Nominations are now open for the 2024 Golden Apple Awards! The prestigious Golden Apple Award recognizes exceptional Greater Green Bay teachers. Nominations for teachers and teams of teachers who have made a positive impact will be accepted now through Friday, October 27, at 3 p.m. The nomination forms can be found below:

• English: https://greatergreenbaychamber.typeform.com/to/THLGkS4W
• Spanish: https://greatergreenbaychamber.typeform.com/to/Ccc6IubJ

Please show your support and take some time to nominate our fantastic GRACE teachers!

Further information can be found here.

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

On September 20 and 21, the 6th-grade students embarked on a two-day field trip to Camp Tekakwitha located in Shawano, WI. Nestled amidst tranquil woods and serene waters, Camp Tekakwitha provides an unforgettable experience for our students. Students were chaperoned by their homeroom teachers, Ms. Clare Zipperer and Mr. Tomerot Lambert. Ms. Brittany Dudzik, our assistant principal, also tagged along for the adventure!

One of the highlights of the trip was the exhilarating canoeing adventure. The students paddled their way through the crystal-clear waters of the camp’s lake, surrounded by towering trees and a gentle breeze. It was a test of their teamwork and coordination as they navigated the water, ensuring they didn’t tip over. They learned valuable lessons about communication, trust, and the beauty of working together in nature’s embrace. “My favorite part about camp was canoeing. We were able to visit an island in the middle of the lake and even canoe through a tunnel!” said Garett, a 6th-grader in Mr. Lambert’s homeroom.

Besides canoeing, the camp offered a wide range of team-building activities designed to foster cooperation, communication, and problem-solving skills. “I really enjoyed trying to work together to get through the spider web,” said Quinn. “It was nice being able to practice our communication skills and work together to try and beat the challenge.” Another popular activity was archery. Students were able to practice using a bow and arrow to hit targets. For many of the students, it was their first time ever using a bow. Other activities the students participated in included shaving cream wiffle ball, human foosball, beach volleyball, a campfire with smores, and writing personal letters of affirmation. These activities not only strengthened their friendships but also taught them valuable life skills that will serve them well in the future.

Camp Tekakwitha is not only about adventure and fun; it also provides students with opportunities for reflection and spiritual growth. In a tranquil chapel located near the lake, the students gathered for a prayer service hosted by Father Adam, pastor at St. Bernard Parish. They also spent some time in self-reflection. They reflected on the beauty of nature, their friendships, and their personal growth during the trip. It was a poignant moment, as they realized that amidst the adventure and excitement, they also found moments of peace and serenity.

Camp Tekakwitha served as the perfect backdrop for a memorable and transformative experience that will stay with these students for years to come.

“It was a wonderful time spent with the students and the perfect way to begin the 2023-2024 school year! I enjoyed being able to see the students outside of the classroom and help them explore new things. I am grateful to have been a part of this experience,” said Ms. Dudzik.

Camp is a major part of the middle school experience at St. Bernard Catholic School. Not only do the 6th-grade students get to go to Camp Tekakwitha every fall, but the 7th-grade students attend Camp U-Nah-Li-Ya in winter and the 8th-grade students attend Camp Anokijig in spring each year as well.

St. Bernard Catholic School (PK3-8) is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school with open enrollment serving preschool students and elementary students from Kindergarten through 8th grade. St. Bernard provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

STAR Assessments are short tests that provide teachers with personalized learning data for each student. Students may take a STAR test for early literacy, math, or reading. Teachers analyze the data they receive from STAR Assessments to learn what students already know and what they are ready to learn next, to monitor student growth, and to determine which students may need additional help. These tests are research-based and scientifically proven to help teachers guide each student on their unique path to proficiency.

More information can be found here.

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

St. Bernard Catholic School had students participate in several activities this year on their service day which they deemed “kindness goals.”

The first kindness goal was to make pretty rocks to share joy with someone they know. Students chose a rock to paint and brought it home to share with a neighbor or family member of their choice. Another goal was to make potted flowers to share God’s creation with the local neighborhood surrounding the school. Students got to decorate a cup and then plant the flower inside. The cups and flowers were delivered to nearby Green Bay homes.

Students also created decorations for the elderly to brighten their day and to let them know that someone is thinking of them. Several craft projects were available for students to choose from to create a colorful door decoration. Kindness matters! Students were taught to show kindness to others and know why they were serving with a video read-aloud, kindness sing-a-long, devotion, and a journaling page.

Another kindness goal was to make a toy to show love to pets who need a home. Students created cloth toys for pets. They were brought to a Green Bay area cat and dog shelter for those in need.

The last kindness goal was to make bookmarks for the donated books. The students decorated their chosen bookmark and placed it with a book for a child who may not have many books in an effort to share the love of reading with all.

Kindness is very present in the St. Bernard Catholic School community, among the students and staff who will continue to spread it in many different ways.

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

For the third year, GRACE’s Our Lady of Guadalupe (OLOG) Outreach Program was successfully presented to students and families from Father Allouez Catholic School, Holy Family Catholic School, St. Bernard Catholic School, and St. Thomas More Catholic School. A total of 172 children and adults from 56 families were involved and engaged in a series of workshops this past January through April.

Generously funded by Milwaukee’s Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, the OLOG Outreach Program is meant to establish family activities and student programming to help both parents and students understand how to work together on issues of school engagement and academic success while fostering cultural integration. Dr. Jamie Tyrrell, principal of St. Thomas More Catholic School, describes the program this way: “From my perspective, the OLOG Outreach Program is designed with Hispanic families first. We want them to feel like an integral part of our Catholic school system.”

Ninety eight percent of the students who attend St. Thomas More are Spanish speakers, so the program was very beneficial to the school.

“Our staff helped plan the workshops and were presenters,” she said, “We had a large portion of our families attend.”

The OLOG Outreach Program achieves all of their goals in the context of empowering families through faith. The topics of this year’s workshops were Faith at Home, Internet Safety and Mental Health, Importance of Early Childhood Literacy and Preparing for High School and Higher Education. Presented primarily in Spanish, each two-hour session included a prayer, presenters speaking on workshop topics, interactive activities, take-home materials for families to use at home, and refreshments. The presence of vocations was evident as priests celebrated Mass and led prayer with Sisters affiliated with our parishes participating as well. Childcare was provided for younger siblings in order to allow students and their parents to attend. Organizations who contributed their time and talents included the Diocese of Green Bay’s Hispanic Ministry, the Green Bay Police Department, the YMCA, and Casa Alba.

In addition, teachers from participating schools provided their integral support at the workshops. The 2022-23 OLOG Outreach Program Team members were Alejandra Beals, Crystal Blahnik, Gabrielle Calewarts, Kim Desotell, Kay Franz, Dr. Jamie Froh Tyrrell, Jere Kubuske, Karlet Negrete, Lisa Niemuth, and Edgar Zaragoza. This team’s role is to plan the workshop topics and participate in the workshops as well as provide evaluation as to the program’s objectives.

Mrs. Blahnik shared, “Over the course of this year’s workshops, families and students have connected and become friends. This program has facilitated a very strong community of Spanish-speaking families who are engaged with their childrens’ education and equipped with tools to help them raise their children to their full potential.”

Through participation in the GRACE OLOG Outreach Program, families:

• Engage with other families in deepening personal and family faith life.
• Enhance personal knowledge of community resources for the health, safety and well-being of the family unit.
• Learn strategies for maximizing at-home support of student learning.
• Acquire knowledge of technology utilized at their child’s school and how to access key information pertaining to their child’s learning.
• Receive guidance in deciphering standardized test scores and learn how educators use this information to design instruction.
• Connect with GRACE school families to deepen the spirit of community and family friendships.

GRACE will again offer the OLOG Outreach Program during the 2023-24 school year in January through April. Information will be available during the Fall 2023 semester.

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

GRACE’s Technology Integration Team has successfully rolled out their first “Tech Tote” this
year!

Since the inception of our Integration Team in 2020, we have been working toward the goal of providing the tools and training to help our educators successfully teach their students through integration of technology within the classroom. Over the past few years our team researched the best tools to help master our technology standards, secured funding through the Catholic Foundation for the Diocese of Green Bay to purchase these tools through various grants, created lesson plans and assembled totes.

This year our goal was to plan our strategy to introduce our first tote: Adafruit (coding circuit boards). After sharing an introductory video about Adafruit to teachers, the team scheduled a two-day presentation with every fourth grade class in GRACE. Day one included a discussion about “what is coding”, an introduction to the block coding software.

Students created their first block code so the circuit board would light up and make a siren sound. Day two was a software review, creation of a “lucky wheel” block code and transfer of the code to the actual circuit board. Students were thrilled to see their code work. Teachers learned along with the students and began generating ideas on how to incorporate Adafruit into other subject areas for next year.

The team has also begun to pilot several other tech tools to create additional totes for the 2023-24 school year with other grade levels. These tools include 3D Pens/Printers (Middle School), Spheros (Grades 3 & 5) and Beebots (K-Grade 2).

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

Greetings GRACE Families and Friends,

Over the 12 years that GRACE has existed as a system, we have found ways to become stronger together while continuing to celebrate the uniqueness of each of our communities. As I finish my first year as Superintendent and my seventh year with GRACE, I am amazed at the beauty and uniqueness of each school. Each community comes together in a unique way to serve children, create a Christian community for families, and live our Catholic faith. The gift of serving all our schools allows me to see the beauty and diversity of our Green Bay Catholic community.

In addition to faith and families, GRACE values high-quality education. One way we ensure this is through learning assessment tools. These tools hold us accountable and allow us to respond individually to each student. Our school leaders use the results to plan professional development and make curricular choices. Most importantly, our teachers look at the results of tests and quizzes and use them to adjust how they teach. One standardized assessment that we use is the Fountas and Pinnell Assessment. K-5 teachers administer this assessment by sitting individually with each child and reading with them. This standardized process determines reading levels to help students read and learn with books that fit their skills.

Over the past several years, the Diocese of Green Bay required the use of the NWEA Measures of Academic Progress Assessment (MAP tests). We will be ending the use of this assessment along with the rest of the Diocese of Green Bay and begin using the Star Assessment. The Star Assessment tests reading and math. This tool was selected in part because the tests are short, accurate, and the assessment data is efficiently accessible by our teachers to adjust instruction for each child. This test also better aligns with our Catholic faith in our schools.

This year, one of our biggest curriculum changes was using Project Lead the Way Launch, a hands-on science curriculum discussed elsewhere in this newsletter by our Director of Curriculum, Laura Blicharz. In the program, students begin each unit by learning about an area of science and then using that knowledge to solve problems through hands-on experimentation and design work. In addition to this work, we spent time with our teachers learning about how faith and science are interconnected and how to share these natural connections in the classroom.

GRACE also made great strides in technology this year. We are updating our long-term plans and strategy to remain low-cost and highly effective. This summer, projects are underway to increase the safety and security of our online environment. Our Technology Services Team continues to provide consistent and high-quality service to our teachers and students.

First and foremost, what makes Catholic education different is sharing the very person and love of Jesus with our teachers and students. It is also the way teachers seek to instill traditional Catholic values in our curriculum, handle problems on the playground with Catholic morals, and the way all staff helps each child learn to love one another. Our faith informs the decisions we make with our purchases of books, our Internet security, and every other decision. Most importantly, we point to our faith as the reason we treat students and families with love and respect.

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

Save the date!

GRACE will be hosting our annual Welcome Back Mass on Sunday, September 17! All GRACE families, staff, and parishes are welcome as we join in prayer together at the start of a new academic year. The mass will be taking place at Prince of Peace Catholic Community, 3425 Willow Rd, Green Bay, this year. It will begin at 6 PM with an ice cream social to follow!

We are looking forward to seeing you there! Please contact us if you have any questions.

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.

Catch up on all of the latest GRACE news by checking out the Summer 2023 Newsletter. Read about some of the service projects students participated in, learn how Holy Cross is going green with an outdoor classroom, discover how a STEM-based program is changing how students learn science, and more! Click the button below to start reading.

St. Bernard Catholic School is part of the Green Bay Area Catholic Education (GRACE) School System. It is a private Catholic school serving Preschool and Elementary through 8th grade (PK3-8) with open enrollment. St. Bernard’s provides an individualized education in a faith-based environment. Each child is supported not only academically, but spiritually.