Guest Bloggers: Mike and April

This past mid-term, five of our boys were on the honor roll and two were very close, which is awesome for freshman. We call that success!!

Hey everyone, this is Mike and April from the Carola Home.

This time of year our boys are balancing school and athletics as well as preparing to go home for the holidays. This can be an overwhelming time for all the boys, but especially the freshman.

Freshmen have already been adjusting to new houseparents, new school, new curriculum and new friends. Our four Juniors have had a couple of years to learn what works for them to succeed in all areas.  However, our three Freshmen still have a lot to learn and this is usually the hardest time of their high school years.

Thankfully, our Juniors have taken our Freshmen under their wings and given them advice on how to deal with homework – number one being do not get behind with missing assignments – classes and teachers, where to go and who you may have to be extra nice to. And of course advice on their houseparents – don’t try that, they won’t let you get away with this, handle your business and they won’t make it theirs.

Each student has their own ways to succeed and all seven of our boys are doing just that, succeeding. With all that high school life brings to offer our boys, they are doing an amazing job keeping up with it all.

In our eyes my boys are all number one!!!!

St. Joseph’s gives the boys a lot of support with the learning center, which is run by our High School Academic Advisor, Steve. Steve works with Chamberlain High School to help them with their homework.  Our Transitional Specialist, Pam, helps our Juniors with upcoming college trips and helps them plan for the future after St. Joseph’s.

Basketball season has started with Errol, Cody, William and Kyle playing for the Chamberlain Cubs. Our home will be attending many games in the next couple of months to support their fellow classmates.

Shawn is involved in CHS’s Wrestling Team.  We also have one student Dean, who has been actively preparing for the past several weeks to attend LNI (the Lakota Nation Invitational), to participate in the Knowledge Bowl Competition. Trey, one of our Freshmen, is not in any sports. He thought it would be best to give all his focus on his schoolwork, so he can continue his streak of no missing assignments and A honor roll.

 

Guest Bloggers: Mike and April

The Carola Home won the high school trophy for with least missing assignments!!

Working hard and having fun!

Hello again from the Carola Home! A new year has begun and our boys are doing a wonderful job with all they have to do. This year we have four Juniors and three Freshman boys in our home. They have worked hard with school work, homework, tutoring, football, other activities and home responsibilities.

First quarter we had five boys make the honor roll and two who were just short of the honor roll, giving our home a GPA of 3.32. Besides studying hard, part of their success is not getting behind in their school work and not having many missing assignments.

The boys had a great time at Wild Water West!

With all the hard work they put in so far, they really enjoy having some downtime. With donors helping provided for St. Joseph’s Indian School, each home has a budget that they go by. Part of this budget goes to home trips. Home trips are a great time to relax and have fun and build relationships. At the beginning of the year, our home went to LifeLight Music Festival and Wild Water West. They had a great time camping and enjoying some wonderful music, go carts, going down the water slides and swimming in the wave pool.

With funds for a trip already spent, the boys had to come up with a way to make money. Our boys decided to do a car wash to raise funds for another home trip.

The car wash was a great success.

The boys used a no school day for the car wash. They asked for a freewill donation to support their home trip. They washed many cars and they spent all day with such a positive attitude and worked very hard. They made enough money for the trip – hiking at Harney Peak, shopping at the Rushmore Mall, and dinner and movies in Rapid City.

The boys are always saying “thanks for dinner” and while we were out at the restaurant they said, “Thanks for dinner.” We reminded them that they earned this themselves and thanked them for dinner.

They were very proud and so were we. They also realized how working hard can pay off.

Big smiles from the Carola Home.

 

High school life

Hello again from the Carola Home. This is a busy time of year for our high school students wrapping up the last quarter of the school year while preparing for next year and beyond. The boys and girls must balance their classes, sports, donor luncheon trips, college trips, jobs and spending time with their families and home. This can overwhelm some of our students and they may begin to struggle with keeping up with their homework and grades.

One of our freshman boys was selected to attend the Cultural festival later this month. Four of our boys are attending the college trip to Southeast Tech. Three of our boys were selected to go on the upcoming donor luncheon trips to Oklahoma City and New England. Being selected for things like this encourages our students and proves to them that they can make it – that they can become a Junior, a Senior and a Graduate!!

These boys have worked hard at maintaining honor roll all year.

This year our Carola boys have done an amazing job. Most of our 8 sophomores and two freshmen have seen their grades only rise. Some have been on the honor roll all year, while others have come closer than ever before. One started the year with a GPA below 2.0 and he may make the honor roll this time. Yah!!!

This week the 1^st -8^th grade homes at St. Joseph’s are on their Spring Break, leaving our Chamberlain high school students seeing what real life is like. In the real world, life goes on even when you can’t be included because you must work or go to school.

Campfire, hot dogs, Missouri River and smores. The boys were in heaven!

While the younger homes are away, however, the older kids do play. We took our boys to the Dude Ranch (a local spot that offers public access to the Missouri River), where they built a campfire and cooked hotdogs. We also invited the other homes to come out and share SMORES…YUM!

The rest of the week is all about basketball. The high school homes are celebrating the Chamberlain Cubs going to the state basketball tournament in Sioux Falls. Thanks to donor support, the homes are able to go to the State championship games to support their team. GO CUBS!!!

Good luck Cubs!

The St. Joseph’s High School students are traveling to Sioux Falls for the State Basketball Tournament to support their Chamberlain Cubs basketball team.

#24 is the senior and #2 is the junior forward injured in the first game of the district tourney, both from St. Joseph’s Indian School and both mentioned here in Claire’s blog.

Your friend April,
St. Joseph’s Indian School houseparent

 

Carola Home Trip

The Christmas tree and decorations are put away.

The New Year’s resolutions have been made.

The boys had so much fun on their home trip to the Black Hills!

Now it’s time to get cracking with those books and getting through second semester. You would think the fun and exciting times would be over. That is not the case. This time of year for many homes here at St. Joseph’s begins with what we call the home trip.

Every year, each home on campus takes a home trip. Home trips are a wonderful time to relax and enjoy time together as a home without the stresses of homework, schedules and responsibilities. It’s a time to step out of the home routines and just be ourselves. It’s a time to get to know one another better and build friendships and relationships.

Derrik and Tommy stop for a picture while skiing.

We took our home trip this past weekend. The adventure took us to Terry Peak in Lead, South Dakota. This is the second year our home has made this trip. The boys enjoyed it so much last year that they voted to do it again this year. The boys have looked forward to this trip all year and now they have the memories.

We stayed in the beautiful Buffalo Trail Lodge. This is where the boys played in the snow, where they laughed at times, played games and watched movies.

The boys spent most of the two days skiing while others did snowboarding.

The boys had a lot of fun. They were very appreciative that donors help provide such an amazing experience. As one of the boys stated, “You guys are spoiling us!”