Campus Ministry

To assist in the development of a Catholic faith community with Jesus as their exemplar, St. Francis students and faculty, in conjunction with the Priests, Campus Ministry, Retreat Coordinator, and the Religion Faculty, organize and direct the spiritual activities of the school community. These activities include student retreats, bible studies, community liturgies, penance services, community prayer, personal conferences, and Christian Service.

Retreats

St. Francis provides an annual retreat experience for each student. The retreats are structured appropriately for each grade level and are designed to help students deepen their relationship with Jesus, each other and themselves. All retreats are a required part of the religious formation at St. Francis.

Service Projects

St. Francis High School is a community centered in Christ. It is a living body whose members are joined by bonds of love, extending itself into family life and into the community in which it exists. The Catholic high school stresses the transference of learning into action as a Gospel imperative. The curriculum leads and encourages sensitivity, involvement and continuous response to social responsibility within and outside the Catholic school. Students are led to realize that they are responsible for their actions, their immediate community’s actions as well as the larger community. Every opportunity for social responsibility is encouraged through all phases of the school’s extra-curricular activities.

Christian service is only one curricular element in the overall preparation of students for their effective leadership and service in and through the church. The importance which St. Francis High School gives to experiential learning is underscored by the requirements of a designated number of hours per year in Christian service.

Goals

• To bring the resources of the high school (student power) to bear on the needs of the world as the student responds to real life issues in the family, parish and school, the local civic community, and broader global community. To offer the experience of Christian service mandated by the Gospels.
• To help students come to a deeper understanding of the meaning of service, especially in a Christian context, and to a life-style of peace and justice and to Christian education.
• To provide the student with “faith and service” learning opportunities beyond the classroom. Christian service enables the student to experience the variety of human needs in a way which combines active involvement with a reflective, Christ-centered perspective.
• To draw on the current religious studies of the student in order to broaden and deepen the dimensions of such service and provide new experiences of service that will inform and expand religious studies.

Objectives

• To stimulate and to cultivate competencies necessary for Christian service; to promote Christian attitudes toward service in a variety of situations, i.e. school community, family, parish life and church community, human services in the greater community.
• To engage students in a well-supervised process which will support the personal and spiritual growth and development of the whole person.
• To integrate Christian service experience with reflection and evaluation in order to appreciate the Gospel mandate to serve one another.

Christian service is possible within a variety of settings. An acceptable service activity will provide the student with the necessity to confront Christian identity questions, e.g., What does it mean to be Christian, to be Catholic? What is my motivation? What is my reaction to being last, to being servant? How can I be leader and a servant? What will this cost me? What impact does the Gospel have on my willingness or lack of …?

Program Policy

• The program will involve all students 9 through 12.
• The year will require 20 hours per student.
• The program is a graduation requirement.
• No money may be received.

Requirements

The student must meet minimal requirements at the end of each quarter. If these are not met the quarter grade will be lowered by one letter grade.

• Each student will be expected to keep a log of hours signed by the person for whom the service was performed or other adult supervisor.
• Each student will meet with his/her religion teacher for purposes of logging hours and meeting deadlines. If these deadlines are not met the quarter grade will be lowered by one grade. By the end of the third quarter, all service requirements must be met. Religion grade for each quarter will only be affected if the requirement for that quarter has not been met. If there are some requirements from previous years that have not yet been fulfilled by graduation the diploma will be withheld until all requirements have been met.
• A reflection paper is the fourth quarter requirement due by mid-term of the fourth quarter.

The development of the program expands not only in focus but also in depth over a four-year period. Project areas are emphasized as follows:

The school makes available to the students a variety of possible projects which will enable them to become involved. In addition, individualized placements/projects may be negotiated with the religion teacher or director of the program.

The choice of activity/project/placement is expected to provide an experience in Christian service with faith reflection under competent supervision.

Activities, other than those listed, will be accepted on the basis of the student’s ability to satisfy the above criteria. All Christian service projects will be reviewed regularly.

Possible Services

• Joining a parish choir
• Tutoring an elementary school student
• Volunteering as a library aide
• Volunteering as an office aide
• Cleaning school parking lot and grounds
• Cleaning parish parking lot and grounds
• Helping in church nursery school
• Donating time to help elderly or disabled:
  • Shoveling snow
  • Washing windows
  • Reading to the elderly
  • Raking leaves
  • Doing housework
  • Visiting shut-ins
  • Preparing meals
  • Grocery shopping
  • Addressing Christmas cards

• Helping the poor:
  • Free baby sitting
  • Helping in a soup kitchen
  • Preparing a complete meal for a needy family
  • Helping in the food pantry

• Taking part in:
  • Crop Walk
  • Special Olympics
  • Right to Life

Activities for juniors

• Women’s Resource Center
• Food Pantry
• Habitat for Humanity
• Father Fred Foundation
• Amnesty International
• Right to Life
• Humane Society
• Nursing Homes
• Medical Care Facility
• Soup Kitchen
• Goodwill Inc.
• Goodwill Inn
• Salvation Army
• Department of Natural Resources