Aug. 31, 2022

Trinity Catholic School

MASSENA – This year’s school theme, “Love in any language is spoken here,” was born out of a couple of teachers talking in the faculty room last June. Mrs. Boyea, PE teacher, and Mrs. Montroy, music teacher, shared that they were going to coordinate their lessons and focus on different areas of the world during the school year. The students would hear music and learn dances and customs from these places. Their intention was to expose the students to different cultures, but also show that despite our differences, we’re all the same in our hearts. As other teachers heard this, they wanted to include pieces of this into their classwork. Before we knew it, a school theme was born, complete with a theme song, “Love in Any Language” by Sandi Patty.

If we break down the theme and start with “love”, this is referring to God’s amazing love for us all, but also our love for each other, as humans. The phrase “any language” emphasizes inclusion of all our brothers and sisters in Christ on planet Earth. Lastly, “spoken here” shows us that love and inclusion happen in our classrooms, in our hallways, in our dining hall, and on our playgrounds. We hope that our students will then spread God’s love and their love with every interaction they have outside of our walls.

This year, we will have bulletin boards, songs, schoolwork, art projects and pictures featuring different countries, cultures and languages.

Along with a new year, new staff members often come. We’re thrilled to welcome back two faith-filled teachers: Mrs. Heather Doe and Mrs. Loralee Marsh. Mrs. Doe took a short break from teaching but missed spending her days teaching students. She’ll be teaching our second classroom of fourth grade. Mrs. Marsh has returned to Trinity Catholic after having moved back to Massena from North Carolina. She has taught for the Diocese of Ogdensburg for more than 20 years in various grades. She’ll put that to good use in the third grade this year.

We’re also excited to welcome Mrs. Victoria (Tori) Lippassaar to PreK3 and Miss. Brooke Beaudoin in Kindergarten. Tori was a substitute teacher for us last year, and we’re so happy that she has joined us permanently this year. Brooke comes to us with previous experience in PreK, kindergarten and special education. The students will love her positivity and energy!

At the end of last year, we were able to start loosening some of the COVID restrictions that we had in place for the safety of our students and staff. While we completely understood their need, we were so thrilled when we could again welcome parents, visitors and community members back into our school! Seeing the dining hall full (though spaced out) of family and friends watching the PreK celebrations, having parents, grandparents and alumni help us with the Bike Rally and Family Picnic, and having community members come into the school to share with our students about their jobs were some of the highlights of last year. We look forward to sharing all of our events this year with our extended Trinity Catholic School family.