The year is fast approaching! New Family Orientation is Tuesday and Freshmen Orientation is Wednesday. All teachers and staff report on Thursday and then Monday morning at 7:50, the 2009-10 school year will officially begin. Where has the summer gone?
If you are like me, summer typically ends with a list of tasks undone and a series of goals unfulfilled. No matter how much I do, I somehow always planned on more. I saw almost all of my family, traveled to wonderful places, made numerous memories with my boys, read many of the books on my "to read" list. Still I wonder, what if I only had another week? But no amount of wishing can change the inevitable.
Throughout all of human history, people have marked transitions--shifts in time, change of seasons, rites of passage. In education, we often fall into the rut of marking endings but glossing over the power of beginnings. We close each school year with Commencement, an ending which is also a beginning. But the start of school often hits us in a bustle of meetings, syllabi, and school supplies. The next thing you know, we are talking about mid-terms. We have attempted to break that cycle at the MSL High School with our Opening Convocation.
This year marks our third Opening Convocation. Two years ago it was held the first hour of the first school day on campus. Last year it was moved off campus to both raise its stature and make it more accessible to the parent community. This year we have moved it back a few days because for some, it was difficult on the night before the first day of school, especially with younger children at home. So our Convocation will be on Thursday August 20, 2009 at Hyde Park Community United Methodist Church at 7:00 PM. (Please see the CHCA website for directions.)
Please come and join us as we open our year in worship, song, and prayer to the Lord! It will be a special time as we reconvene from the summer and celebrate what God will do among us this year. All are welcome. I look forward to seeing each of you!
