Welcome back to all the St

James community. We trust

you had a blessed and restful

Christmas and wish you only

good things in this coming

year.

Let us begin the year with a

quote by Joyce Rupp for all

of us in this wonderful com-

munity.

May you slow your hurried

pace of life

so you can be aware of, and

enjoy,

what you to easily take for

granted. As you saw in our monthly

calendar and in the informa-

tion to the left. We are back

in the swing again. Our Feb-

ruary calendar is already fill-

ing up.

St James staff continue to

attend in-services and work-

shops after school and during

the day. Learning truly is a

life-long experience, as you all

well know.

Absence and Illness/Safe

Arrival Calls

When your child is going to

be absent due to illness, ap-

pointments or other arrange-

ments, kindly call St. James

@ 416-393-5275. For the

sake of the safety of all our

children.

We remind you also not to

send your children to school

if they are sick, it may pro-

long their illness, and possibly

infect others. We also cannot

keep children in for recess.

Of course a letter from a doc-

tor concerning allergies, mo-

bility, etc. will be taken in to

account.

Letters, Calendars, News-

letters, and Permission

Forms come home on a

regular basis, kindly ask your

children and check backpacks

for information coming

home. It contains vital infor-

mation about what is happen-

ing on a day to day basis.

Fire Drills and Mock Lock-

downs

We completed our compul-

sory 3 fire drill practice, and

our 1st lockdown of the year.

The fire department were

pleased with the speed in

which we cleared the build-

ing, and we have addressed a

few suggestions such as lock-

ing classroom doors. Our

Mock Lockdown was ex-

tremely successful. Everyone

followed all safety regula-

tions and knew exactly what

was expected of them.

Should you ever come to the

school door and the Lock-

down sign is up– No one will

admitted. Do not call your

childrens’ cell phones as use

during such a time is unsafe.

Cameras, Cellphones, and

other valuables.

After Christmas we see many

students with new valuables.

Please be reminded that we

cannot be responsible for the

misplacement or loss of such

items. Cameras and cell-

phones should not be used on

the school site for privacy and

safety issues. Should your

child need to contact you, they

may do so in a supervised en-

vironment with a staff mem-

ber near by.

Students who misuse elec-

tronics ( in class, on the play

yard )will have them taken

away for the day, the second

time the items will be held in

the office overnight, and the

third time will not be returned

unless the parent/guardian

comes to the school in person.

Special Guest Crime-

Stoppers

We had a superb presentation

via Crime-stoppers to share

with all our grade 4 and 8’s

about internet safety. Kindly

be aware what sites your chil-

dren are “visiting”. Many of

our students were told by the

officer during the presentation

“You should not know this

information” regarding guns,

gangs, drugs street life etc.

Kindly discuss this worrisome

issue with your children re:

Volume 4, Issue 4

St James Journal

Upcoming events:

Jan. 6th

-Officer Claudio visits JK and

SKs

-Skating grade 6/7 &7/8

January 12th

-Public Library gr 3/4

-KINDERGARTEN and new

student registration 5-8 pm

January 13th

-Skating grade 3/4

January 14th

-PIZZA LUNCH

January 18th

-Grade 4 Assessments

January 19th

- Jelly Bean guess begins

-CSAC mtg at 6.30

January 20th

-Skating grade 6/7 &7/8

January 21st

-PA DAY no school for stu-

dents

January 27th

-Skating grade 3/4

January 28th

-Sub Day

- Civvies Day

Principal Report P.1

Principal Report cont. P.2

Literacy Day P.2

Virtue Awards P.3

Volleyball Success P.3

CSAC, Trustee Template P.4

Safety, Thanks Kudos, and P.4

Inside this issue:

January 2011

Our student council has been

very active under the guidance

of their staff mentors. The

chair and secretary have already

met with me to plan events for

this term, including a “Jelly

Bean Jar guess”, a Winter Car-

nival, a civvies (dress down-but

not inappropriate day), as well

as a Culture/ Heritage Day giv-

ing all of us the opportunity to

share our heritage during Black

History month in February.

Kindly note that January 21st

will be a PA day and there will

be no school for students. This

is a meeting and assessment day

for the staff. Our Elementary

Provincial Report Card (your

child’s 1st formal report card)

will be coming home just after

Valentine’s Day with interviews

on the evening of the 17th, and

the morning only of the 18th of

February. Do watch for the

request form for interview

times in early February.

Please note that these reports

will be more “language

friendly” and more

“personalized” than previous

years’ reports.

You can see more information

by contacting :http://

www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/

policyfunding/growSuccess.pdf

Birthday Celebrations:

No doubt your children have

shared that we celebrate birth-

days monthly now via the of-

fice. Classroom recognition

happens on the child’s birth-

date. Every month usually in

the last week, the office recog-

nizes all children with birthdays

that month-with a card, a gift

( the child may chose from a

variety of items) and enjoy a

treat (usually a popsicle) to-

gether in the gym.

Please do remember that stu-

dent achieve success via com-

munication and support be-

tween school and home. Check

your childrens’ agendas daily,

return teachers’ calls, and share

the school/home contact with

your child. Teachers cannot be

called out of class to answer the

phone, but will return you call

within a day. Please ensure

that all your phone numbers

are up to date, so that we too

can contact you with good

news, concerns about health,

etc. In December, we had 2

families that were unreachable

when a child was injured and

needed to go to the hospital.

Turn off the TV and

video games for one

hour a night to do

homework or quiet

reading

Use it or lose it! Read-

ing is like a muscle, if

you do not exercise it.

If you do exercise it

often, you will not

maintain the same level

Family Literacy Day is January

27th

Here are some ideas of what you

can do as a family at home.

Surf the internet to discover

fun and educational sites. (It

is always important for a

computer to be in a area that

the family can see not in a

child’s bedroom.

of reading ability as

you get older

Visit your public li-

brary every week

Write a letter, short story or

song

Do crossword puzzles word

jumbles and word searches

Your child can pick up early

math skill by playing games

that include counting, skipping

Page 2 St James Journal

their TV shows, video games

played, and Internet use. The offi-

cer felt that many of our students

were “de-sensitized” to real life. If

you son/daughter in grade 4 and

up has not shared about this pres-

entation-do ask them to talk to

you about it.

December was chock full of

events including our Advent mass

–a sensitive, respectful , song filled

celebration of the Eucharist.

Our Christmas concert was a real

delight. The children were fabu-

lous. I thank all the staff on your

behalf for their extensive effort to

make the night so successful.

I share once again the major con-

cern for the night. We did ask

parents to wait until the end of the

concert to pick up their children at

the end of the concert. By leaving

the gym and leaving through

doors that were now open to any-

one made our building unsafe.

We pride ourselves that St. James

is a well secured building. Audi-

ence members who left the gym

disturbed the presentations going

on which was unfair to other fami-

lies who were trying to watch their

children. They missed a few valu-

able announcement, the final draw

and a request for prayers for a

school family who lost their fa-

ther.

Don’t forget to

tell

your friends, and

neighbours how

great St James is.!

September –

Hospitality

Elmer Cartagena

Deborah Pereira

Robert Helseth

Jillian James

Carlos Umana

Alyson Salazar Moreno

Sarah Kay Eves

Sindy Cartagena

Abigail Bonilla

Malik McGregor

Jester Antonio

Vincent Pham

Gabriella Bobadilla

Zoe Aurelio

Cameron Fenech

Page 3 Volume 4, Issue 4

October – Gratitude Keri Wheeler

Jamal Sehweil

Karen Tran

Jose Castellanos

Julian Cadeau

Nicholas Sousa

Ivy Pham

Anna Huynh

Lucas Paiva

Christopher Vargas

Nathaniel Cabalfin

Aaliyah Echeverri

Shay Montaque

John Ngo

November – Peacemaking Ashley Alvarez

Jasmine Dos Santos

Nilani Fredericks-Sierra

Jordan Nguyen

Jizianny DeOliveira

Marvin Truong

Mireya Salas Valdes

Arthur DeMoura

Victoria Gregori

Kallon Edwards

Our Parish is: St James Catholic Church 728 Annette Street Toronto Ontario M6S 2E2 416-767-6451

Our pastor Father Juan can

be contacted at the church

via phone or email

St.james@sympatico.ca

John Ngo, Anton Mrazovac, Hanibal Negassi,

Jerome Belle, Patrick Cristina, Ednid Horaj, Aaron

Schwalb, Jesse Seguna, Christopher Sousa, Marvin

Hernandez

Kaitlyn Wheeler, Sarah Riccardi, Shay Monteque

Samantha Seguna, Trianna Amaning, Tadia

Damassia, Sierra Gies, Eva Vieira, Sandy

DaCunha

Thanks and Kudos to:

our CSAC for arranging that all classes get wished by the

man in red—Santa

Mrs. Cochrane, Mrs. Pacheco, Mrs. Costanzo, Mrs. Bugeja,

Ms. Mazza, Mr. Demski and Madame Bodnar and the stu-

dents for a great Christmas Concert

Mrs. Costanzo and Mr. DosSantos for coaching our inter-

mediate volleyball teams to pendants (page 3)

Brian the manager of Loblaws who donated some sweet

treats to our students pre-Christmas

My Principal is Proud of :

How our students sympathize and showed care to our

families who have lost a family member, who write

notes and remember our sick students by letters, and

prayer.

How great our St James students are in school masses.

St James Catholic School 230 Humbercrest Blvd. Toronto, Ontario M6S 4L3

More important information for our students’ safety.

http://www.tcdsb.org/

schools/stjames.asp

Kindly ensure that if

your son or daughter

will be late or absent

from school that you

call us. The school

number is 416-393-

5275. you may even

leave a message at night

as our answering ma-

chine is on. We want

to ensure your child is

in a safe place and so if

we do not hear from

you we do make safe

arrival calls. Sometimes

there are many, and so

this is a 40 minute

process. Do help us

out so we can be sure

your child is safe.

We remind you that St

James is an “allergen

aware” school. This

means that many of our

children have allergies

when certain foods,

odours are present.

We do have staff that

are First Aiders and

trained in CPR, but we

wish to avoid any possi-

bility of contact. One

trigger in particular is

nuts, so kindly ensure that

food sent to school do

not items to school that

have nuts or have pack-

ages that read “may con-

tain nuts or nut products‟‟

Electronic devices and

items of value (cash or

sentimental) may be mis-

placed or get lost. We

cannot guarantee that

such items do not go

missing and so, cannot

take responsibility for

them.

Cell phones, and camera

use are discouraged. Do

familiarize your child with

the benefits but also the

perils of their use, in par-

ticular privacy issues. We

as a school have permis-

sion from many of you to

publish your child‟s

photo, but other stu-

dents do not have such a

privilege. Please also re-

view the use of Facebook

and other such websites.

Face book is blocked

here at the school, but I

know many of our stu-

dents are on these sites.

As I mentioned earlier do

monitor your child‟s

computer use. “You

Tube” has some fun sites

but also many that are

totally inappropriate for

students.

Remember it is said „that

it takes a village to raise a

child.” Let us, the school

and our parish work with

you as community to

continue to do such a

fine job within our excel-

lent Catholic school

community we call

St James Catholic

School Advisory

Council (CSAC)

Our CSAC continues

to meet monthly, and

all are invited to join

in.

Our next meeting is on

January 19th at 6:30 pm.

For more information

contact:

Chair: Josie Gies

Email:

csac.stjames@tcdsb.org

Voicemail:

TORONTO CATHOLIC DIS-

TRICT SCHOOL BOARD

TRUSTEES – 2010-2011

Wards

1. Peter Jakovicic

2. Ann Andrachuk, Chair

3. Sal Piccininni

4. Patrizia Bottoni

5. Maria Rizzo

6. Frank D’Amico

7. John DelGrande

8. Tobias Enverga

9. Jo-Ann Davis, Vice-Chair

10. Barbara Poplawski

11. Angela Kennedy

12. Nancy Crawford

Natalie Rizzo –Student Trustee