WEEK AT A GLANCE

CRUSADER CONNECTION for the Week of December 10th through December 14th OLGC Mission Statement: “We exist to offer a life-changing encounter with Jesus and equip leaders to transform the culture.”

Sunday, December 9th• Second Sunday of Advent

Monday, December 10th- • Deadline to order January Hotlunchonine• Teacher Appreciation Luncheon - Thank you PVC!• 1:20 Lockdown drill - no one allowed in or out of the building

during this time - please plan accordinglyTuesday, December 11th-

• 7:30 Walking Rosary - sponsored by DAAD• 9:00-9:45 - 7th & 8th grade boys Praise & Worship (chapel)• 10:00-10:45 - 7th & 8th grade girls Praise & Worship

(chapel)Wednesday, December 12th-

• 7:30am Mass (school chapel) all are welcome!• Reconciliation preparation

Thursday, December 13th- • NO DIVISION LITURGIES (Reconciliation in its place)

• 8:30 - noon - Reconciliation• 12:30 - 2:00 - Reconciliation• 3:15 - 4:00 Chess Club (commons)• 7:00pm - Band Christmas Concert (gym)

Friday, December 14th - • 7:30am Mass (school chapel) all are welcome!

• Room 6 only - Out of Uniform - Auction Raffle reward • 8:30, 10:00 & 1:30 - Christmas play (commons) • Scrip orders due

Please join usDecember 18th

from5:15 - 6:30pm

Meet at the front entrance of school. We will

greet our Religious

Formation Families and

bring good cheer to our neighbors!

Dear OLGC Families, We are embracing the Advent season at OLGC Parish School. We invite each family to make a commitment to prepare your hearts for Christmas. You may consider:

· Joining our school for Mass at 7:30 AM on Wednesday and Friday mornings

· Attending a Holy Hour from 5:00-6:00 PM on Wednesday followed by Mass

· Listening to Fr. John Riccardo’s talk on the kerygma from the Parish Day of Renewal (www.olgcparish.net/media/)

· Download the Focus on the Family Advent Calendar Devotional (https://www.focusonthefamily.com/magazine/advent-calendar)

· Sign up for Dynamic Catholic’s Best Advent Ever and receive an email with short inspirational videos and practical tips for your everyday life (https://dynamiccatholic.com/best-advent-ever)

· Praying a rosary together as a family each week· Reading the Jesse Tree passages in the Crusader

Connection each weekMay this advent be a time of true spiritual awakening and renewal for your family as you prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ!The results are in! The Fall Crusader Bash was a huge success! Thank you for your support of our great school. Because of your generosity, we are able to implement The Leader in Me, improve technology, modernize classrooms, make capital improvements, and provide special events for our students. We raised $100,000 at the Fall Crusader Bash! Please take a moment to provide feedback on the Fall Crusader Bash by completing a brief survey: https://olgcparish.wufoo.com/forms/ruxvq2d1dbzm5o/ A recording of the last coffee chat may be found on our website. Please let me know if you have any questions after hearing updates on our strategic plan. In addition, you will find information about our Student Support Program in this issue of the Crusader Connection. Thank you for your continual support as we live our mission at OLGC Parish School. In Christ,Melissa Hunt, Principal Advent Prayer for FamiliesHeavenly Father, your son, Jesus, is your greatest gift to us, a great sign of your love. Guide us as we strive to walk in that love together as a family this Advent. As we prepare our hearts for Christmas, bring us closer to each other and to your son. Give us the grace and strength we need every day. Help us to always trust in you. Come, Lord Jesus, lead all people closer to you. Come and dispel the darkness of our world with the light of your love. Amen.

Catholic Vantage Financial Federal Credit Union is no longer able to provide tuition management for our school starting with the 2019/2020 school year.OLGC School will be using a new Tuition Management Company. FACTS is used by many schools in the Archdiocese of Detroit, locally and nation-wide.The payment options will be the same as with Catholic Vantage, (monthly, bi-weekly, pay in full) but will also include credit card payment.Each family will go into the FACTS website and register for a payment plan. The tuition deposit will be due upon registering. ($200 per child)Reregistration letters will go out to our returning families on January 14. It will include the instructions on how to go to the FACTS website and set up the registration.

The OLGC online Spirit Wear Shop is live and ready to fulfill orders

in time for Christmas!Please visit

advancedspiritgear.com

SPIRIT WEAR!!We continue to be so blessed by our student leaders at OLGC. This week we shine the spotlight on a few of our many outstanding examples of

leadership over the past couple of weeks: Ann Marie M., Rico L., Alivia S., Dominic S., Melissa R., and Jack B. One student was a model of prayer to his peers in Chapel; another continues to serve and be compassionate to younger students; one student's respectful lunchroom behavior doesn't go unnoticed; another student's enthusiasm and effort in music is much appreciated; and lastly two students showed great service in helping Mr. Dan with lunchroom or mass set-ups.

We can't wait to see what virtuous leadership is shown the next two weeks before Christmas vacation.

Lighting the Flame

— Angela Maile, Campus Minister

Sacramental News

• 6th-8th gr. students being confirmed on June 7, 2019:  See website for forms and registration links: olgcparish.net/holy-confirmation.

◦ If you were unable to attend the Candidate/Sponsor Day on December 8th, a folder will be coming home from school before Christmas break.

◦ Candidate/Sponsor information forms are due Monday, December 10th. If you need another copy of the form, a link can be found on the Confirmation web page, under LINKS.

◦ Saturday, February 23rd: Confirmation Retreat to be held in the OLGC church gym (NOTE NEW LOCATION) at 9:00-1:00 or 2:00-6:00. Snacks will be served. Please register if you haven’t done so already: 6th Gr. Confirmation 2018/19: 6th Grade Confirmation Retreat: February 23, 2019

• 2nd gr.: Please be sure to mark your calendars. Dates, information and registration links can be found at olgcparish.net/sacramental-prep.

◦ January 12th, 9:30-12:00 or 1:00-3:30 in the church social hall: First Reconciliation retreats. Please register for a retreat.

◦ January 25th, 6:30 pm in the church: Family First Reconciliation service for last names beginning with A-L.

◦ January 26th, 9:30 am in the church: Family First Reconciliation service for families with last names beginning with M-Z.

◦ February 9th, in the church social hall: 2nd Gr. Mid-Year Check-Ins. Please register for a time.

• 1st gr.: Please sign up for the First Grade retreat coming up on Saturday, February 2nd. Registration link can be found on the First Communion/Reconciliation web page: olgcparish.net/sacramental-prep.

Questions? Contact Ann Grobbel at grobbela@olgcparish.net or 734-453-0326, ext. 232.

Father John announced that as a parish on Wednesday before evening Mass, we will join together in praying what is known as Evening Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours. The Liturgy of the Hours is often referred to as “the prayer of the Church.” Clergy promise at their ordination to pray five times a day for the sake of the Church, this collection of Psalms, other Scripture readings, and intercessions. I learned to pray it with friends who were discerning priesthood and religious life. When I was discerning religious life, I had the opportunity to hear a few orders sing and pray it together and it truly is a beautiful prayer.

As Father stated in his note to the parish, at virtually every hour of the day, people in every part of the world offer this prayer of the Church to almighty God, for the whole Church, and in fact for the whole world. Father John wrote that it is our desire during this Advent season to join as a parish family into this prayer. In doing so, we also hope to model, especially for families, a remarkably rich way to pray in our homes. One app I recommend to use as a family is: iBreviary, an online app containing a digital breviary as well as a variety of other liturgical texts. This is my favorite. We will build this prayer into our chapel time here at the school. May your advent be richly blessed and your family be overwhelmed by all God has done for us in His son Jesus!

As is our tradition at Christmas we make a special request for a SMALL donation from each family so that we may give our priests, Fr. John, Fr. Prentice, and Fr. Dave a monetary gift for Christmas.

There is no obligation to participate. We will have cards in the front office for you or your student to sign beginning Monday, December 3rd. Please have your donations to the office by December 14th. Thank you!

Lunch and recess are always in need of volunteers to ensure a safe, clean, and fun environment for our children. SignUpGenuis links to volunteer for lunch and/or recess are emailed to all volunteers each month using

information provided to the chairperson, Lisa Postl, at the beginning of the school year. These forms remain open throughout each month for volunteers to switch dates, sign up for new dates, or to remove their name from a pre-selected date.

If you’d like to volunteer in the lunchroom or at recess, please send a note to Lisa Postl at lisapostl@yahoo.com, and she will add your name to the distribution list.

Also, please continue to check the SignUpGenuis links to see if you might be able to pick up additional shifts that are open.

**You must meet the Safe Environment requirements prior to volunteering at the school. Please see the office for more information.

ADVENT CONCERT

Monday, December 17th 6:00pm at OLGC CHURCH  (5:30pm student arrival in JP II Room)

Featuring all students Pre-K - 6th grade and also our Choir! Our PVC and EDGE team are graciously hosting a

reception in the social hall following the concert.

All are welcome! Their voices will truly put you in the Christmas spirit!

OLGC is pleased to introduce a new way of thinking at our school! We are in the beginning stages of implementing a Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) at our school. MTSS is a school wide prevention framework that integrates assessment and intervention to maximize student academic achievement and pro-social behavior. It is a philosophy that considers all learners and ensures that all students are getting the instruction needed and meeting maximum potential. Universal screening assessments are typically brief, conducted with all students at a grade level, and followed by additional testing or short-term progress monitoring to corroborate students' risk status. The purpose of screening is to identify or predict students who may be at risk for falling below grade level benchmarks.

There are 3 tiers of intervention in the MTSS model. Each child is in at least one of them! Research based instruction and progress monitoring are provided at each level.

Tier 1 intervention generally occurs in the classroom when teachers provide differentiated instruction to every child. 80% of our students will make adequate progress with this core instruction.

Tier 2 exists to provide intervention to those students who are not making adequate progress during Tier 1 instruction. This intervention is provided in groups of 2 to 5 students two or three times per week in the support room for 20 – 30 minutes per day.

When students have received tier 1 and tier 2 instruction and are still not making gains, MTSS calls for an individualized, intense level of instruction in Tier 3. Generally, no more than 5% of our students will need this type of intervention. Diagnostic assessments are also given in an attempt to pinpoint why students are not learning. Tier 3 intervention is usually one-to-one student-teacher instruction in the support room 4 to 5 days a week for an average of 40 minutes per day.

Please feel free to contact our Student Support teachers with any questions you may have. Mrs. Linda O’Sullivan at osullivanl@olgcparish.net Mrs. Carol Stowe at stowec@olgcparish.net

The Student Support room is ready for students!

Mrs. Stowe provides support to a pre-Kindergartner.

We have added a guided reading library and intervention materials to the

Student Support Room.

Mrs. O’Sullian and Mrs. Stowe

Mrs. O'Sullivan works with a group of kindergartners on letter recognition.