Dear Friends,

 

During this Thanksgiving season, we give thanks for the special community that has taken root in Fells Point. At a time when our world faces many challenges, Cristo Rey Jesuit High School offers hope. Our school community shows that people of goodwill can come together and build a school that promises to transform the city. And as our first graduates near the end of their first semester in college, that transformation is happening now!

 

We invite you to take few moments to read this year's annual report. It chronicles the great blessings our school has received. Please know that you are deeply appreciated.

   

Our school community gathered this morning for a very meaningful prayer service. We reflected on the abundance in our own lives. As you prepare for Thursday, we leave you with this Thanksgiving prayer by Ralph Waldo Emerson:

 

For each new morning with its light,

For rest and shelter of the night,

For health and food,

For love and friends,

For everything Thy goodness sends.

 

                          

 

A Cristo Rey Jesuit education is affordable because students work to help pay for their education, earning approximately $25,000 over their four years. Scholarship benefactors partner with individual students to make this education possible by also providing $25,000 over four years. We need 50 scholarships for the class of 2016 who will begin at CRJ in fall 2012. 

Opportunties to meet with leaders like Rhodes Scholar/All-American football star Myron Rolle make CRJ a special place.

 

Cristo Rey Jesuit's scholarship campaign is off to a great start this school year! In October, trustee Nancy Erickson and her husband John came forward with a generous commitment to provide an additional scholarship for every two full, four-year scholarships we secure. They will provide up to ten through this challenge gift. At the time that the challenge was issued, 14 four-year scholarships had already been secured. To date four benefactors have responded to the Erickson challenge. We seek another 16 to fully meet the challenge. Will you join us? For more information, please contact Jessica Favret, director of development at 410-727-3255, ext. 1006 or at jfavret@cristoreybalt.org.

 

Seeing is believing, so take a moment and watch "Fulfilling Dreams," which highlights how CRJ has made a difference in the lives of our first graduates. There wasn't a dry eye in the house when we viewed it. Please enjoy!

 

When Cristo Rey Jesuit's Corporate Internship Program team decided they would no longer outsource all the student transportation needs, they were taking a big chance! Their to-do list was long: buy vehicles, hire and train drivers, and plan transit routes. Three months into the new in-house transportation program, the outcomes have all been positive! We have hired a terrific team of professionals who transport students safely to and from their corporate internships every day.

 

Led by Leroy Delly, transportation coordinator, the team begins each day with a prayer for the students. Said Dale McKenna, "I was shortchanged when I was younger because we didn't have a school like this!"

 

Sylvester Johnson chimed in, "I've never seen such well-mannered young folk. Young people do not get the opportunity to work. Here the scholastic part and the work part all come together." The drivers say that students share the ups and downs of the work day. And for their part, Mr. Delly said the team is committed to the students, "I'm so impressed that our drivers know so many students by name."

 

 CIP Director Janet Shock applauds the drivers. "What's been so impressive to me is their commitment to mission. They embrace our goal of preparing students for college and they have taken ownership of that."

 

Cristo Rey Jesuit is grateful for the new team of exemplary drivers:

Transportation Coordinator: Leroy Delly 

East:  Jeannette Curtis (PM), Eddie Burwell (AM)

Southwest: Betty Butler

Hunt Valley: Sylvester Johnson (West)

Owings Mills: Gary Haigley

Towson 2: Dale McKenna