The education director for Holy Trinity Catholic School Division is thrilled that the division managed to provide staff and students with enriching faith-formation activities this year despite the upheavals of the pandemic.
Sean Chase provided board trustees with an update during their recent meeting about the initiatives the division has carried out since September 2020 to build and strengthen the Catholic faith in youths and employees.
By providing a faith-based education rooted in the gospel message of Jesus Christ, the division believes that faith formation serves staff and students well so they can contribute to their school communities and others in the wider community.
“(I’m) proud to present … what I would suggest is an incredibly successful year given the conditions and challenges we faced in terms of maintaining faith and our faith journey for our students and staff,” he said, “particularly after a very successful Catholic Education Week (from May 9 to 16).”
The division kicked off its faith-forming activities in August with an opening day faith retreat for staff. Beginning in September, every grade participated in virtual school retreats with either the Archdiocese of Regina or a youth ministry leader.
The rollout of the Grade 7 religion program was completed this year, while the program for Grade 8 is expected to be implemented next year and should complete the overall rollout at the elementary level. Meanwhile, there were fewer faith leadership meetings for vice-principals — three one-hour sessions were held — since the division scaled back any meetings that required bringing in substitute teachers during the pandemic.
The work that the provincial Catholic Education Coordinators Association of Saskatchewan group performed this year by creating faith permeation documents “is nothing short of outstanding and ahead of schedule,” said Chase, “so kudos to those folks across the province who completed that work. We’re excited about rolling that out to administration and then to school-based staff.”
Vice-principals who are considered faith leaders will share these documents with staff in June and the fall.
The connection between churches and schools was strongly maintained this year, Chase said. This was shown by the 29 activities listed in the report, from clergy visits to liturgies at schools to tours of churches.
The one area that was halted this year was the in-person faith formation meetings for new teachers. The division plans to provide two days next year for teachers in their first, second or third years.
“There are some types of meetings where this format — virtually — lends itself to this type of application,” said Chase. “We’ve struggled with it this year, to be honest. It’s a personal journey and sometimes those meetings would get a touch emotional while people are working through it.”
These meetings review the resources available to newer teachers, help them understand more about the permeation of the Catholic faith in all subjects and the materials available to do that, how they should be good examples, and other web resources, he continued.
“It’s really about opening up dialogue of how to celebrate your faith as a classroom teacher and how to ask crucial questions — and where to go to ask those crucial questions — when you’re addressing some of the challenging topics,” Chase added.
After Chase’s update, many trustees commended the work that the division had carried, including that of religion consultant Jodie Bzdel.
The next Holy Trinity board meeting is Monday, June 21.
