September 19, 2008

Dear Parents/Guardians & Friends:

Congratulations to our Commended Scholars
I would like to congratulate seniors Luke Changet, David Prior and Kate Rainier who were announced yesterday as Commended Scholars in the National Merit Scholarship Program.  Way to go!

Magazine Sale Extended
Because of the days off of school, the Magazine Sale is being extended through Monday, September 29.  Remember that our goal is 30K.  Students who turn in six orders may dress down for the run of the sale.  Siblings who turn in an additional two orders for each sibling after the six can also dress down or both siblings can turn in four orders each.  This is a House competition!

140 Volunteers Still Needed for the County Fair
The Fisher Catholic Athletic Association is looking for volunteers to take tickets at the Fair.  The dates are October 6 – 11.  Three shifts per day, 6:45-11:45, 11:30-4:30, and 4:15 – 9:00.   We need 12 workers for every shift, a total of 216 people.  Volunteers receive free fair admission on the day they work.   We do not handle any money, only tickets and passes.  The FCAA receives $6500.00 for this fundraiser.  Please share this information with grandparents, friends, family or any FC supporter.  To volunteer, contact Brian and Elaine Householder at 687-4626 or ehouseholder@columbus.rr.com .   If not, they will contact you.

Mandatory Parent Substance Abuse Meeting
The Advisory Board of Fisher Catholic has ratified a new Substance Abuse Policy which is in effect for this school year (It can be found in the handbook).  As part of this new policy, which has been put together through a hard working Student Wellness Committee through out the course of the summer, all parents are required to attend a one hour workshop on issues of drugs and alcohol on an annual basis.  The dates for this year’s workshop (parents only need to attend one) are Sunday, October 19 and Thursday, October 23, both beginning at 7pm.  Both parents must attend, although not necessarily together.  Please mark your calendars and plan on attending one of these meetings.

Panel Discussion on Bullying
The Triumph Organization will be at the Fairfield County District Library on Tuesday, September 23 to conduct a forum on female bullying.  Tami McCandlish, who came to our school last year, is the Founder and President of Triumph.  For further details you may contact triumphorganization@yahoo.com

Special Thanks
Special thanks go out to the Postons, Dean and Michelle, for obtaining and running a generator throughout of black out.  This kept our food in the kitchen safe and able to be used for lunch on Thursday and Friday.  Thanks also to our Maintenance staff, Patrick, Pat and Roger who worked through out the three days we were off and made quick work of our downed tree.

ALS Walk is September 28
The 2008 Annual Walk to D’feat  ALS is Sunday, September 28.  Registration starts at 10 and the walk begins at 11 at the Fred Beekman Park at OSU.  For more information or to register go to www.alsa.org. Ben Thimmes’ team is Ben.  I would love to see the whole Fisher Catholic community turn out to support this organization in honor of Ben.

Help Needed
Behind the soccer field at Forest Rose School which we use for our games, they are making a walking trail for MRDD students.  They are looking for assistance in building this trail.  Deacon Mark Scarpitti is looking for volunteers and can be reached at 653-1500 ext 40.  I am sure that he will welcome whatever time you can give him for this worthy cause!

Principal Observations
What a week it has been!  I offer my observations not because mine are more perceptive than yours but to suggest that all of us share common thoughts, concerns and appreciations in a week such as this.

For me, the image that repeats in my head time and time again is the 17c minister and writer, Jonathon Edwards who, in his sermon entitled, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” tells us again and again about how tenuous and frail is our human existence.  It was the random condition of clear skies that allowed Ike to come roaring in to the Ohio Valley on Sunday.  One branch from one tree knocks into one wire which deprives many houses from having electricity.  Multiply that single action thousands of times and you have the widespread black out that we all experienced.  Of course the downing of that one wire to our one house meant that our whole world was very different for a day or for two or three days (or in Columbus five or more).  It is true that we don’t appreciate our modern life until we are forced to confront its absence. 

In my case, not only was I without electricity (and water since I have a well) but my smart car decided to act very dumb on Monday as it refused to go into gear.  It turned out that one computer chip, not even the size of the nail on my little finger, decided that I should not drive on Monday.   The car got towed by a guy who said, “Yea, I towed a car just like this one last spring whose front end was all smashed in by a deer.”  When I told him that was me, he just laughed.  After my daughter picked me up and deposited me back to my dark, waterless cabin in the woods, I thought about how much I take things for granted.  Certainly the people who can repair the electric and my car are people who I really appreciate this week.  I can’t fix my car or restore my electricity.  Thank you!!

As tenuous and frail is our human existence, and no matter what life lessons we try to learn from a week such as this, we humans do tend to slip pretty quickly back into our narrow minded frame of life.  No sooner had my electricity gone on then I was grousing about the cable tv not working!  Here I was, the night before, sitting in a chair trying to read by candle light and now I was frustrated with not being able to push a button and be entertained by 50 different channels!

What was the good of this week?  The weather was beautiful and I saw more people outside their homes this week than I have ever seen before.  When I was a young boy in Baltimore Maryland it was common to see people sitting outside on their stoops on a summer night because no one had air conditioning.  But that lack of air led to an abundance of community.  I heard of many acts of kindness this week.   People shared what they had this week.  Although it was harder to communicate this week electronically, communication between people increased!

When Jonathon Edwards compared us to lowly insects caught in a spider web hanging by a thread, he was trying to scare his congregation into being good.  What I take from the frailty of life is to count your blessings, and learn from your challenges.  Goodness comes from your appreciation of what you have and the lessons you learn from what you don’t have.  Finally, it is during weeks such as this that my favorite expression becomes my prayer:  Let Go, Let God!

There has been much talk about whether these three days counts towards our five calamity days.  Yes they do.  We have two days left before we need to start making them up unless one my many bosses tells me differently.  Let’s hope the snow is light this year.

Thanks for all that you do for your children and our school.

Jim Silcott
President/Principal