Dear Parents and Guardians,

As we travel through the school year, our second set of Parent/Teacher/Student conferences are just around the corner. The conferences are scheduled for Wednesday, February 16th, from 4:00 to 6:30 P.M. These conferences are either recommended by the teacher, or may be scheduled by a parent/guardian if they wish to attend a conference with a teacher or teachers. It is not required to attend a conference for this session of conferences. The Skyward conference scheduler will be open to elementary parents on Wednesday, February 8th, 2023. More information on how to schedule through Skyward will be in next week’s eLedger. Thank you for your partnership.

Catholic Schools Week

Welcome to Catholic Schools Week beginning January 29th, 2023. Please join us at Holy Family Mass at 10:00 A.M. to kick off the celebration week. Please take a moment to review all the exciting events included in celebrating Catholic Schools.

Eighth Grade Graduation

It is awesome to see the eighth grade class approaching the apex of the first part of their educational journey. The eighth graders will be moving forward with a receipt from elementary school and middle school years and get ready to venture into high school.

We will be celebrating the 8th graders at an all Elementary School Mass and graduation ceremony to honor our eighth graders. This celebration will be held on Friday, May 26th, 2023 at 9:00 A.M. at Holy Family. This will be the last day of school for the 8th grade students.

The 8th grade graduation Mass and ceremony will be for 8th graders, 8th grade families and the SMSA school community of kindergarten through 8th grade students. This will allow us to celebrate the accomplishments of being student leaders within the SMSA school community. It will allow younger students one last chance to look upon what they aspire to become in the years ahead of them at SMSA. Thank you 8th graders for being a special class of students that we all can celebrate. Thank you for making us proud of what you have become and what we see for your future.

SMSA GoGuardian Beacon

SMSA has adopted GoGuardian Beacon services as part of our school’s broader suicide prevention program.

GoGuardian Beacon is important to our school community because suicide is now one of the most pressing issues facing youth; in fact, 18.8 percent of high school students in 2019 reported having seriously considered attempting suicide over the past 12 months, according to the Center of Disease Control. CDC, 2019 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS) (2019). Additionally, GoGuardian Beacon may help SMSA intervene even when students have difficulty asking adults for help. Nine out of ten teens (90%) who report symptoms of depression say they have gone online for information on mental health issues – Digital Health Practices, Social Media Use, and Mental Well-Being Among Teens and Young Adults in the U.S. (2018). GoGuardian products are used in over 8,500 schools and 5,000 districts in the US, supporting over 23 million students.

Thank you for your continued partnership with SMSA. Together we create a path for tomorrow’s children to achieve amazing dreams.

God Bless,

Steven Kelnhofer

Elementary Principal, SMSA