St. Charles celebrates Catholic Schools Week

St. Charles Catholic School is observing Catholic Schools Week, an annual nationwide celebration.

According to the National Catholic Educational Association, Catholic Schools Week began in 1974 and always begins on the last Sunday in January.

The school week culminates with teacher appreciation day on Friday. The entire school will gather together, and each grade will perform for the rest of the students. At the end, the teachers will present their dance to “What Does the Fox Say?”

“The kids love to see the teachers make fools and make fun of themselves,” Mayer said.

St. Charles has planned many different fun-filled days for its students such as crazy sock day on Monday and crazy hair day on Tuesday, St. Charles Principal Alec Mayer said.

Elementary school students will also had the opportunity to wear their pajamas Wednesday and read all day long. The middle school students participated in a spelling bee.

On Thursday, the school planned to participate in a school-wide volleyball tournament. Each grade from kindergarten through eighth grade has two classes. Each class, including all the teachers, would be separated into either red or black teams, the school colors. At the end of the day, the team that gained the most points would win.

The students were also allowed to wear their school colors and jeans on Thursday instead of their uniforms.

“Through these events, schools focus on the value Catholic education provides to young people and its contributions to our church, our communities and our nation,” representatives of the NCEA said on the organization’s website.

Before the school week started, students also participated in many different parts of the St. Charles masses during the weekend and performed jobs such as ushering.

Catholic Schools Week will continue beyond the school week with a public open house from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sunday.

In art class, the students have created constellations that will cover the entire art room for the open house.

Mayer said this is an annual art project that has a different theme each year.

“It’s a wonderful, wonderful art program our teacher does,” he said.

Mayer said Catholic Schools Week helps St. Charles open itself up to the community. He also mentioned that registration for the school is now open to the public.

“It’s just an opportunity for us to get the word out to people that they have options,” he said. “It’s something fun and celebrates who we are.”

For many of the eighth-grade students at St. Charles, this will be their last Catholic Schools Week. Since there is no Catholic high school in the Bloomington area, Mayer said the majority of the students attend Bloomington High School North or South.

Mayer said St. Charles provides its students with the knowledge and skills to be successful in high school and said he hopes the students will take their experiences at Catholic school with them for the rest of their lives.

“I would hope that we’ve planted a seed to teach them to be good Christian members of society,” Mayer said.