Friday, September 25th is Individual School Picture Day.  Order forms were sent home last week. All checks should be made out to Lifetouch.  Please do not send in picture order forms until Picture Day.  This will be an out of uniform day.

Wow!  What an amazing Septemberfest weekend.  We cannot move forward without saying a HUGE THANK YOU to all of the volunteers for their effort and countless hours put into all three days making this year's Septemberfest an overwhelming success.  From Family Fun Night on Friday night to the wonderful All-Community Mass Celebration Sunday morning, a splendid time was had by all.  Events such as this would not be possible without you!  Mark your calendars for the third weekend in September 2010 and we will do it all again!  An extra special thank you to Mark McGinty (Septemberfest Chair) and Nancy Verhey and Jane Bachul (Family Fun Night Co-chairs).  Their organizational skills and time cannot go unnoticed.

Minnesota state law requires that schools inform parents and guardians if they apply certain pesticides on school property.  Specifically, this law requires schools that apply these pesticides to maintain an estimated schedule of pesticide applications and to make the schedule available to parents and guardians for review or copying at each school office. Please note that a pesticide may be used on FSCS property on or around September 30th.

The Electric Moment purchas from our annual Gala for Giving 2009 Silent Auction raised money toward upgrading our stage. I am excited to let you know those updates have now been installed.  We invite you to "Come and Take a Peek"!  Thank you so much to all of you, our supporters, for making these upgrades possible.  There are sure to be many future play performances and concerts when you can enjoy these aesthetic updates. 
 
Once again, Thank You for your continued support!
 
Ms. Odegard

Collecting Campbell's soup labels, General Mills box tops, Kemp's milk caps, Tyson A+ Labels, Land O' Lakes milk caps, and Milk Moola milk caps allows us to purchase items for the school.  All families can collect the labels, box tops and milk caps and place them in the collection bins near the front entrance of the school or in the bins at St. Peter's, St. John Neumann, and St. Thomas Becket.  Volunteers are also needed to collect the labels, box tops, and milk caps from the school and the three sponsoring parishes and prepare them for shipment to the company. More information about products and perks can be found on the websites:

Campbell's at:  www.labelsforeducation.com

General Mills at:  www.boxtops4education.com 

Tyson at:  www.tyson.com/projectaplus 

In continuing to make Faithful Shepherd an outstanding academic facility, we are altering our honor roll criteria beginning this school year. As mentioned last year in the Star Report and in the first newsletter of this school year, we feel this change will allow our students more of a challenge to strive. Our new system will look as follows:

While viewing the attendance area on Parent Portal, you may notice that there are several new and different codes used for categorizing attendance.  These new codes are listed below:
 
Attendance Codes:
=Present | A=Absent - Default | AE1=Absent - Sick | AE2=Absent - Medical Appts | AE3=Funeral | AE4=Absent - Other | AU1=Absent - Vacation | AU2=Absent - Parental Choice | AU3=Absent - Other | TE1=Tardy - Sick | TE2=Tardy - Medical Appts | TE3=Tardy - Funeral | TE4=Tardy - Other | TU1=Tardy - Vacation | TU2=Tardy - Parental Choice | TU3=Tardy - Other | S=Suspension | HD=Half Day | ED=Early Departure |
 
Tardies and Absences are excusable for illness, recovery from an accident, professional/medical appointments, death in the immediate family, and other reasons deemed acceptable by the Principal (AE1, AE2, AE3, AE4, TE1, TE2, TE3, TE4).   Tardies and Absences for such reasons as camping, vacations, non-school activities, or visiting are discouraged and are not to be considered excused absences (AU1, AU2, AU3, TU1, TU2, TU3).  If a student is absent from school for a period that is greater than 2 hours, that will be considered a half day's absence.  If a student is signed out from school after 12:30, the ED code is used to indicate an Early Departure. All absences and tardies will be notated on the report cards and student files.  Late night activities that cause a student to be tardy or absent the following day are also discouraged and are unexcused.  All students not in the classroom at 8:00 am are marked tardy, whether excused or not.  Students who are tardy are to  first report to the school office to receive a class admission pass.  The office personnel will mark the student's attendance record accordingly. 

Two weeks ago, all students were sent home a Student Content/Works Consent & Release Form.  This form will replace the Photo Release Form and Website Agreement Forms that were in the August mailing.  Please sign and return the new forms ASAP. 

 

Mark Your Calendars For Our Annual Marathon For Non-Public Education

 

When:  Sunday, October 4th

Time:  1:00-3:00 pm

Where:  FSCS

Who:  You!!

What:  Bike, stroll, roll or walk your way around the 2 mile route.

Questions:  www.fscsmn.org

 

Marathon Update

 

Our first collection date brought in $4,843.00.  Way to go!  8 students brought in $125.00 and they have all earned a Faithful Shepherd Cinch Sack! 19 students brought in their goal amount or better already!  38 students brought in $50.00 or more.  Those student names were entered into an incentive drawing to win a "mystery prize".  This week's prize winners were Jack Sweeney and Samantha VanBuren both from 5th grade.  They each won a gift card to Cold Stone Creamery.  Our next Marathon Collection date will be Friday, September 25th.  (Reminder: Ensure you've sent in $20.00 per child for Marathon T-Shirt Day).

 
Marathon Volunteer Help

The Marathon Committee is looking for Volunteers to help with the with pledge collections and prize distributions for the following  dates at 8:00 am - September 25th, October 2nd  & 9th. We need your help to make this a great event  for our students and to raise funds for our school. To volunteer for this or the Marathon on October 4th, please contact Mia Hendrickson at mia.hendrickson@district196.org or Kaleen Mikulski at kmikulski@comcast.net.

Where:  Wakefield Park in Maplewood
Who:  5th through 8th Grade Boys & Girls
When:  Saturday, October 3rd at 8:00 AM
Interested:  Contact Mr. Redman
(no prior registration necessary)

Over the summer, FSCS installed a new phone system.  We appreciate your patience as we worked through many glitches the first few days.  Due to the new system, callers will be able to directly dial some often-used numbers.  These new numbers replace the old extensions. 
 
Sodexo Food Service:  651.262.2892
YMCA School Age Care:  651.262.2893
Faithful Shepherd Nurse's Office:  651.262.2889
Faithful Shepherd Attendance Line: 651.406.4740
 
Also, teachers no longer have separate office extensions.  To reach a teacher's voice mail, callers should call the main school number, 651.406.4747.  During the day, your call will be transferred directly to the teacher's voice mail.  After office hours, you will reach a dial-by-name feature. 

If your family lives in the Burnsville-Eagan-Savage School District (#191) and are interested in exploring the possibility of bus service for your children, please contact Yvonne Houle-Gillard, ymhoule@hotmail.com or 651-452-5316, by Friday, September 25.  Yvonne will collect this information for Mr. Boone, who has agreed to discuss the possibility of bus service for students who live within the boundaries of District #191 with Faithful Shepherd's existing bus company. The per student cost is dependent upon the number of students transported.

When a change takes place in the family, through death or a divorce or separation, it has a profound effect on all family members.  Grieving is a natural process which evolves from an emotional loss.  SJN is sponsoring the RAINBOWS program at FSCS.  It will open with a parent/child orientation on Thursday evening, September 24th from 6:30-7:30 pm and continue on Thursday evenings throughout the fall and winter months.  The program is open to any child regardless of religious affiliation.  There is no cost to participate.  A child may enter the program at any time.  If your family could benefit from this program we invite you to call Bonnie Serio, Elementary Faith Formation Specialist at (651) 454-2079 ext. 2208 or email at bonnies@sjn.org.

It's time to think about a 6 year FSCS tradition. The Holiday Classic Boutique is just around the corner and volunteers are needed to help plan and coordinate. This event will need 5 core planners and several more to assist the day before and during the event. This year's Holiday Classic Boutique is November 21, 2009. Please sign up on the FSCS website under the Home and School Association tab. Or you may emai Jeanette Wells at always.smile0107@gmail.com. I look forward to working with a great team to make this event memorable and successful!

Kowalski's Eagan Market has generously agreed to include Faithful Shepherd as one of the beneficiary organizations included in its fundraising activities.

The program is called Groceries for Good Causes and has been part of Kowalski's for many years. They enroll 15 local, non-profit organizations and each of those organizations has a box in a kiosk at the exit of their store. Customers place their grocery receipts in the box of their choice and they track those receipts daily. At the end of the quarter, they total up all the receipts and make donations to all of the participating organizations based on their percentage of the receipts. Note that the donation is determined by the number of receipts, not by the amount of the purchases on the receipts. This allows our customers to determine who gets the donated funds.