01 19 24 Vol. 45 No. 45 No. 22

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THELEAVEN.ORG | VOL. 45, NO. 22 | JANUARY 19, 2024

SOUTHERN REGION SCHOOLS SHARE IDEAS, OFFER SUPPORT

LEAVEN PHOTO BY KATHRYN WHITE

Attendees — (from left) Brendon McIntire, Holy Trinity School, Paola; Kelli Wolken, principal, St. Rose Philippine Duchesne School, Garnett; and Matt Stevenson, St. Rose — take part in a joint teacher professional development day on Jan. 2.

LEAVEN PHOTO BY KATHRYN WHITE

During the Southern Region’s professional development day, designed to help small schools share ideas, participants — (from left) Rae Ann Johnson, St. Rose, Garnett; Suzanne Colwell, Holy Trinity, Paola; Jessica Culbertson-Walker, Holy Trinity; and Megan Staley, Sacred Heart, Ottawa — talk about everything from curriculum to Scripture. By Joe Bollig joe.bollig@theleaven.org

P

AOLA — All teachers face many challenges, but teachers in small towns and rural schools face one more: isolation. This is what Amanda Foltz, third and fourth grade teacher at St. Rose Philippine Duchesne School in Garnett, discovered. In some cases, a teacher in a small school may be the only teacher for her grade level.

“I was a public school teacher before coming [to St. Rose], and I had a team of three other teachers I met with every week,” said Foltz. “We collaborated and bounced ideas off of each other. So, when I took this position, that was one thing I was worried about — that I’d be on my own island. “But it hasn’t been bad at all. The Southern Region has helped.” Catholic schools in the Southern Region have helped by holding a joint teacher professional development day for the past two years.

LENTEN DINNER NOTICES

This year, teachers and administrators from St. Rose, Sacred Heart School in Ottawa and Holy Trinity School in Paola met all day on Jan. 2 in Paola. Twenty teachers and three administrators attended. The teachers met in the morning to learn about a new curriculum, broke into discussion groups by grades, had lunch and then participated in Scripture study for faith formation. It filled a need that Kelli Wolken felt keenly for a while. “I’ve been principal at St. Rose

WHEN

DEADLINE

Feb. 9.

Jan. 26.

The Leaven will publish a list of Lenten dinners in the archdiocese on

Because of space considerations, notices are limited to around 40 words and are due

INCLUDE

Philippine for six years, and I was a teacher before that,” said Wolken, one of the three principals who organized the day. “One of the things that bothered me as a teacher was not knowing what other schools were doing. [Schools in the] Southern Region are very isolated because we are so small and have no next-door neighbors, per se. We don’t have the network of resources of other schools [in urban areas of ] the archdiocese. >> See “EDUCATORS” on page 6

• Time of event • Date(s) of event • Address of event • Specify dine-in, curbside, delivery, etc.

SUBMIT

Please email your information to: todd.habiger@ theleaven.org.


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