
Principal's Weekly Update
March 1st, 2024
A Message from Dr. Nadjarian
Dear Families,
On Tuesday, we welcomed Superintendent Tom Carroll to St. Mary’s. We are forever grateful for the time that Mr. Carroll spent with us and for all his dedication to our Catholic Schools. We will miss his leadership and wish him the best of luck as he transitions to the next step in his career!
Best of luck to our boys and girls basketball teams this weekend as they compete at Boston College!
Have a great weekend!
Looking Ahead
March 5th
- "Family: The First School" (Session 2) at 8 a.m. in School Cafeteria.
March 6th
- Trimester 2 Grades Close (K2-8)
March 8th
- Special Someone Dance: 4 - 6 p.m.
March 13th
- Report Cards Released (Grades K2 - 8)
- Spring Clubs Email Preview
March 14th
- Dress Down Day Today
- Parent Teacher Conferences (Grades K2 - 8)
- No EDP Today
March 15th
- No School - Parent Teacher Conferences (Grades K2 - 8)
March 18th
- No School - Pastor's Day
March 19th
- School Mass at 8 a.m. for the Solemnity of St. Joseph. (Grades K2 - 8)
March 20th
- Spring Clubs Registration (Spring clubs will begin the week of April 8th and conclude the week of May 27th)
March 22nd
- Middle School Open House: 9 - 11 a.m.
- Stations of the Cross - Families Invited (Grades K2 - 8)
March 27th
- Progress Reports Released (PreK - K1)
March 28th
- School-wide Morning Prayer: 9 a.m. - 9:45 a.m. (PreK - Grade 8)
- Early Dismissal at 11 a.m. for Holy Thursday (PreK - Grade 8)
- No EDP Today
March 29th
- No School - Good Friday
April 1st
- No School - Easter Monday
School Board Member Spotlight: Michelle L'Etoile
Over the next few weeks, we will continue to spotlight our incredible school board members. They are indispensable members of our community who are responsible for big-picture planning, such as directing the vision of St. Mary's, budgeting, and discussing curriculum.
Michelle L'Etoile serves as a member of the St. Mary’s School Board. She is the Director of Graduate Admissions at Boston University School of Law. She leads the recruitment, admissions, and enrollment strategy for the law school’s LL.M., master’s degree, certificate, and other non-J.D. programs. She has over 30 years of experience in admissions having overseen J.D. admissions previously at New England Law | Boston and Boston University School of Law.
Always a lover of languages, Michelle received both her B.A. in English and Ed.M. in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) from Boston University. She enjoys learning new languages and practicing with her students who come from over 45 countries each year. Currently, she is an avid watcher of Korean drama shows.
Michelle has been a parishioner at St. Mary’s for 25 years and lives with her husband Albert and their two teenage children, Juliette and Charlie, in North Brookline.
Thank you, Michelle, for your dedication to our school and community!
Enrollment Update
Congratulations to the winners of our early re-enrollment raffle! All winners have been notified. Thank you to those who have completed re-enrollment for next school year.
All families have received an email from the FACTS/SIS Family Portal with instructions on how to re-enroll and have until April 1st to complete the re-enrollment packet. If the re-enrollment packet is not submitted by April 1st, your family's enrollment status will be considered withdrawn for the 2024-2025 academic year. If there are any extenuating circumstances regarding your family's decision to re-enroll, please make us aware as soon as you are able.
If for any reason your family will not be re-enrolling, we ask that you still log into the FACTS/SIS Family Portal and select the "Will Not Re-enroll" option.
If you have any questions about the re-enrollment process, please reach out to Ms. DeLuca at ddeluca@stmarys-brookline.org.
Family: The First School (Session 2) With Mr. Antonacci
"What difference does it make when families deeply understand they are the primary educators of their children?"
"What are the key factors of the family-school partnership for your child to best grow?"
"What strategies can families use to replace the entertainment culture with a culture of learning, wonder, and generosity in their homes?"
Those questions highlight some of the key concepts Mr. Antonacci will discuss at the second session of "Family: The First School," which will take place Tuesday, March 5th at 8 a.m. in the school cafeteria. Building upon the previous session last month, Tuesday's session will focus on the details, theory, and strategy of partnerships with the school and other families. Enjoy breakfast treats and coffee while Mr. Antonacci kicks off the session with a brief talk, followed by discussion questions to learn from each other.
Languages
In Spanish class today with Ms. McAuliffe's K2 students, the class started by singing the hello song "Hola Hola Hola," then they prayed their Marian consecration prayer and listened as Miss Annie prayed the Hail Mary in Spanish with them for the first time. Then they read a book called "Hola Amigo," which includes a short song, and they listened to their friend Paco el Pato who sang for us the song "Canción de la Amistad" (the Friendship song). They also went to the gym for some larger space movement activities such as the Canchita chant (Popcorn) and the Numbers running game. They had such a great time singing, moving, and practicing their Spanish at the same time!
PreK
This week, one area that PreK focused on was experimenting with colors in a fun and interesting way! They first learned that red, yellow, and blue are primary colors. Then, they realized when they mixed two primary colors together, they can create secondary colors. Great job, young artists and scientists!
K1
Our K1 students celebrated their 100th day with lots of activities related to the number 100. In Mrs. Curley's class, students worked on finding the number 100, writing 100, counting by 10's to 100, and coloring the big number. This is not only a fun number for the students to learn about, but it also represents the great consistency, joyful spirits, and hard work all of our K1 students have possessed to make it this far in the year!
K2
Students in K2 also celebrated their 100th day! Ms. McAuliffe's class had lots of fun with 100th-day crafts, counting challenges, and celebrations for being 100 days smarter! In Ms. Tiney's class, students brought 100 mystery items in a bag from home and gave clues to the class on what was inside. Students were so excited to guess and laughter filled the classroom with some of the silly items.
Grade 1
This week first grade learned about the patterns of day and night and the seasons during science. Students participated in a demonstration to learn that the earth rotates around the sun which causes day and light on earth. They also learned about the patterns of seasons and did an investigation to determine which season it would be, given a bag of clues.
Grade 3
Grade 4
Grade 5
Middle School Highlights
Students in Mr Febesh’s class 8th grade social studies class are furthering their understanding of the executive branch. To do this, they are working in groups to make a visual rollercoaster display of the 5 best and 5 worst presidents in chronological order.
Mrs. Allen, Ms. Allen's mother, who has taught the Bible and the Mass for 25 years, gave presentations on the prefiguring of the Mass in the Old Testament to the middle school this week. She traced the events of the Mass from Abel's sacrifice, to Moses and the Tabernacle in the desert, to Jesus Himself explaining His Eucharistic presence.
Follow us on Social Media
Please find the links below to our social media pages. We have been constantly uploading posts and stories so if you are interested in seeing more of our day-to-day happenings, please follow us!
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/st-mary-of-the-assumption-school
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stmaryschoolbrooklinema