Last night my son told me to get some sleep and then laughed.  He reminded me that I never sleep before the first day of school.  My sleeplessness to not due to anxiety about the start of the school year, but a feeling of excitement, joy, and passion for beginning another year; my 50^th first day of school either as a student or educator.  I welcome all the members of our learning community to the 2019-20 school year at Father Leonard Van Tighem School.

Thank you to Mr. Wensveen, Mrs. Danylchuk, and Mrs. Maniedao for their hard work in making the school ready for us.  All the shiny floors look great.  We are excited to welcome new students, families, and staff to our school this year.  New or returning teaching staff include Mrs. Lawrence (Gr. 6), Miss Gabruck (Gr. 8), Miss Loman (Gr. 8), and Miss Tkach (Gr. 7).  Also, we welcome back Mrs. Ehlert (Educational Assistant), and we have Mrs. Walcheske joining us in our Early Learning Program.  Finally, we have two University of Lethbridge PSIII students, Miss Matthews (mentored by Mrs. Alvarez) and Miss Hemstreet (mentored by Mr. Templin).

The first School Council Meeting will be on Tuesday, September 10^th.  I encourage all parents to attend.  School Council plays a vital role in our school community.  Our Welcome Back BBQ and Family Blessing are on September 19^th.  Father William will start the evening with a family blessing at 5:30 pm, BBQ hamburgers will be served after the blessing, and families will be able to ‘meet the teacher’ in their classrooms or the gym starting at approximately 6:30 pm.  Also, Jennifer from St. Martha’s Parish will be there to provide information on Sacramental Preparation.  We look forward to seeing everyone to celebrate the beginning of a new school year.

The focus of this school year will continue to be on growing in our faith and experiencing the richness of Catholic Education, developing literacy and numeracy skills that will prepare students for a changing future, and helping First Nations, Metis, and Inuit students achieve equitable educational outcomes.  Also, we are excited about the first year of our new Faith Plan called Making Our Mark: Journey of an Intentional Discipline.  This year’s faith theme is Beginning the Journey.  The primary focus of Beginning the Journey is a focus on being mindful and being prayerful.  I am looking forward to us integrating our new faith plan with the Van Tighem Virtues of Honest, Accepting, Wise, Kind, Spiritual.

We are getting bigger, both physically and in numbers.  Our new portables are not quite ready; we hope to be in them before the end of September.  Some of our class sizes are getting large, and we are hopeful that once the provincial budget is brought forward in October, we will be able to address this issue.

Like last year, you can pay your school fees and other fees online.  Please click on this logo for more information:

   Online Payments

To help with communication, here are some social media links (please click on the logo):

   FLVT Facebook

  FLVT Website

   @GregKostiuk

   Remind enter 587-600-0226 and text @flvtscnews or email flvtscnews@mail.remind.com  We may be using Remind less this year as there has been a change to the Remind program.  We are looking at other texting options.

   @flvthawks

We look forward to working with you to continue to make Father Leonard Van Tighem School a special place.  On behalf of our staff, I wish everyone a successful school year.

Greg Kostiuk