Date: 25 July 2015
Weekly Memorandum No. 2015 – 7.4
TO: AdZUHS Community
FROM: Father Principal
SUBJECT: AdZUHS this week, July 27 – August 1, 2015.
1. Principal’s Message:
We are educators. As such, we not only perform a job, but we offer a service. We serve not only as imparters of knowledge to the students we teach, but we serve as caretakers as well. Only a few individuals I know went into teaching because they cared about knowledge; rather, they went into education because they cared about kids.
Thus, as teachers, we are expected to supervise the students entrusted to us. This means that each and every teacher is responsible for supervising the class and the children that may be placed under his or her care; this includes class outings, competitions outside the school, practices, and the like.
In the past few weeks, I have been doing the rounds almost on an hourly basis. While I admire those who report to class on time, I am also concerned of those who do not report to class punctually and leave the class unattended, and those who absent themselves from class and do not inform the department chair (and worse, not giving any work for the students to do). Should anything happen while you are out of that room and your students are unsupervised, you are the one who could face action from the legal recourse of the parents. Not only you, for I would face action as well, since the principal holds the responsibility for what happens in the school.
Therefore, I’d like you to do something for me. While reading this message, I’d like for you to make a private review of your classroom responsibilities. I’m not going to quiz you about them; nobody is. But, I want us all to ask ourselves with the integrity of our own minds what we have been doing to provide that “higher standard” of care that is required of us – the cura personalis that is expected of us. Let each of us ask if we have been taking the care we know we should:Do I report to class on time? Is my supervision active? Do I look beyond the situation to pursue the possibilities?
We will do it for our personal integrity; we will do it for the growth of our profession; we will do it for the reason we became teachers – we will do it for our students/kids.
We always have, and, God willing, we always will.
2. Characteristic of Jesuit Education (CJE): Jesuit education insists on individual care and concern for each person (Cura personalis).Cura personalis is not limited to the relationship between teacher and student; it affects the curriculum and the entire life of the institution. All members of the educational community are concerned with one another and learn from one another. The personal relationships among students, and also among adults – lay and Jesuit, administrators, teachers, and auxiliary staff – evidence this same care. A personal concern extends also to former students, to parents and to the student within his or her family.
3. Faculty Update
a. Mr. Carlito A. Robin will attend a training workshop on campus journalism on July 31 – August 1, 2015 at the Human Resource Development Center.
4. Activities and Events for July 27–August 1(St. Ignatius of Loyola Week Celebration)
a. July 27, Monday * Monday Assembly sponsor: Technology and Livelihood Education (TLE)
* 7:30AM Mass: Class sponsor: Gr. 10 Brebeuf
Moderator: Mr. James B. De Los Reyes
* Submission of Test Draft to Department Chairs
b. July 28, Tuesday * Gr. 7 Faber recollection Moderator: Bro. Eric Esteba, SJ
* 7:30 – 8:30 AM: Medical and Dental Checkup for Gr. 9 Ogilvie
c. July 29, Wednesday * 10AM – 12 NN: AdMU Senior High School Recruitment talk at AVR 2; Participants: Grade 10 Ignatius of Loyola
* 1 PM General Assembly (HS Lobby)
* 1:30PM St. Ignatius Mass celebration (ANCC)
* Submission of Test Draft to Assistant Principal for Academics
d. July 30, Thursday Schedule B: Classes in the morning; General Cleaning in the afternoon.
* 1PM General Assembly for everybody (Lobby)
* 1:30 PM Start of General Cleaning
e. July 31, Friday School Holiday: Feast of St. Ignatius of Loyola, Founder of the Society of Jesus
f. August 1, Saturday No student activities in school.
Final preparations for the Aug. 3-4 PAASCU visit
5. Teach us to Pray: Finding God in All Things
Fr. James Martin, SJ
If you asked five Jesuits from different countries to sum up Ignatian Spirituality, which is based on the life and teachings of their founder, St. Ignatius Loyola, they would probably say the same thing: “Finding God in all things.” Funny enough, that phrase isn’t found in Ignatius’s writings; rather, it’s something one of the early Jesuits recounted the saint saying.
What does it mean? Simply put, God is to be found not only in obvious places – like church services, private prayer, and reading the Bible – but everywhere and in everything: in our busy workplaces, in our quirky families, and even when we are by ourselves, feeling lonely. Every moment is an invitation to experience God. This doesn’t mean that every second of our day will feel like a life-changing epiphany, but it does mean that Jesus’ invitation to “Come and see” applies not just to the disciples in first-century Palestine but to us, today. God is saying, “Come, look at your day, and see where I am.”
How can we do this? By noticing.
When you speak with someone, can you see your conversation as a holy moment of encounter? Perhaps they’re struggling – God may be inviting you to care for them. When you eat a meal, can you be grateful for the nourishment and also remember that it’s God who is feeding you? When a sunbeam hit the carpet, can you rejoice in the beauty of creation? At the end of the day, it helps to remembers these things – all things – and be grateful you’ve found God. And, more importantly, that God has found you.
James Martin is a Jesuit priest and author of “Between Heaven and Mirth”, “The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything”, and “My Life with the Saints”.
