Jay Conroy, Principal

Principal's notes

■ Budget and staffing update for 2010-11

Dear Parents,

Our School Board on June 3 will adopt the budget for the coming school year. Work has been done by the administrative team and the Budget/Finance Committee of the Board to assure that the budget:

• Reflects our commitment to our core values and mission;
• Is realistic in terms of expected enrollment and development income; and
• Is fiscally responsible, assuring that Marist continues to be financially sound.

The budget reflects three key assumptions:

1. We have projected enrollment conservatively — 470 students, reflecting a smaller 9th and 10th grade class due to difficult financial times in the community.
2. We are maintaining our commitment to offer a safe, welcoming faith-based campus environment for all students who are willing to take on the challenge.
3. We are maintaining our commitment to strong academics and class size averages of 22-23 per class and with a full offering of activities and athletics for student involvement, while paying our staff wages and benefits that are approaching more closely the regional average.

This past winter we did a full review of our staffing responsibilities and levels of compensation. We compared the work done by teachers, support staff and administration with job descriptions from local school districts and other Catholic schools, as well as their rates of compensation. Finally, we worked closely to make sure our spending reflected our values and our strategic initiatives as decided by the Strategic Planning Process (Staff, Administration, Board and community) this past fall.

The Board, in this budget process, also reviewed income estimates for the school, set a modest increase in tuition and projected a modest increase in development revenue based upon the work and plans of the Business Office and Development Office. It is especially noteworthy that our tuition is still in the lowest 20% of private Catholic schools in Oregon. Our projected development income is steadily moving upwards towards our goal of eventually raising 23-25% of our budget from non-tuition development dollars, a standard that strong Catholic high schools are hitting, even in these tough economic times.

Based on that work, we are very confident that Marist will maintain a strong enrollment. However, we have taken steps needed to assure that we will be able to meet our commitment to continue to offer a strong program, be fiscally responsible, and offer our employees a fair level of compensation.

Our budget for 2010-11 maintains the level of course offerings, campus ministry programs, activities and athletics, but does so with targeted staffing reductions and expense reductions, including:

1. Cuts in teaching staff totaling 1.50 FTE, spread throughout the departments, with no teacher being laid off as a result. Pay increases are aimed at moving all staff members towards 95% of Archdiocesan scale. About 2/3 of our teachers will receive a step of 3% and 3% adjustment to reflect COLA and a move to bring closer parity. The others will receive only 1.5% COLA, no step.
   
   Class sizes will move to 22-23 per class, with maximum size of 30. No class offerings will be lost.
2. Adjustments in administrative support staff, including a permanent loss of the part-time library aide, and a reduction in hours for support personnel in both positions of administrative assistance and campus supervision. Pay adjustments for administrative support have been aimed at paying mid-range of local pay scale for similar positions.
3. Cuts in maintenance and custodial areas, with after-school custodial work being contracted or picked up by students' family members in need of a form of tuition assistance. Daytime custodial and maintenance duties will be shifted from the present daytime position (eliminated) to a new full-time day position that will not have responsibilities for oversight and overall maintenance. That maintenance oversight will be covered by increasing duties handled by administration and a realignment of duties.
4. Development Office staffing will be the most dramatically impacted. We will be increasing our focus on fundraising, communications, marketing and Alumni relations. We will add a long-term Assistant Development Director position, averaging 15 hours per week, to lead special fundraising projects and planning. We will add a second position of Assistant Development Director (full-time) to begin work in February/March 2011, phasing in our recognized need to grow income from Development to meet the needs identified by the Board and administration: salary parity for staff; provide additional sums for tuition assistance to help meet the needs of qualified students and families who are seeking to become part of the Marist school community; and continue to build strong classroom programs and student activities.
   
5. Campus Ministry, athletics and activities will save in transportation expenses thanks in large part to the generous donation of activity buses from the Auction, saving the cost of renting “yellow school buses” from local contractors in all cases except long-haul trips.
6. The present levels of administrative personnel and Main Office support staff will remain the same, reflecting cuts that were made in the last two years. Those levels of administration and support staff are now below the average of comparative private schools, continuing our commitment to be good stewards of the resources we've been given.

Budget Impact: Reductions will save over $100,000 in wages and benefits. Wage adjustments and the new position in the Development Office will result in a net savings of approximately $50,000 in expenses and will generate additional development income conservatively estimated at $30,000 for the budget year.

Finally, we are deeply grateful to our staff for their work and years of commitment to Marist, especially those whose positions are being reduced or eliminated. These staffing and funding decisions reflect a great deal of evaluation, comparison, deliberation and prayer by the administration and board. We trust and believe that our work will result in maintaining the excellence and incomparable experience and opportunities we provide Marist students and the Marist community.

Have a wonderful and safe summer. As always, thank you for your support and prayers,

Faithfully yours,

Jay Conroy, Principal

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Thank you!

The 2010 "Marist Gone Country" Auction brought together a great crowd for a fun evening on May 15. The Marist staff and students thank our generous donors and guests as well as the many people who put in hours of hard work to make the Auction a tremendous success. (Photo by Toni Cooper)

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Chris Fudge, Network Administrator

Important news from the IT Department

Marist Catholic High School has five methods of sending you vital information throughout the school year. I would like to talk about the methods and their primary functions.

We use Constant Contact mass email systems, PowerSchool email systems, direct mass email, the Marist website, and SchoolReach voice systems to direct different levels of information to you (the parents) and the students. We never give out nor sell ANY contact information about our students or their families to any third party for any reason. Parent, school and athletic support groups can access any of the methods, after administrative approval, via the Marist IT Department.

One of our key methods for contact is via EMAIL, and accurate email addresses are crucial to these being effective. PLEASE make sure your current and accurate email address is on file with the school’s Registrar. This includes your student’s email address as well.

Constant Contact is the school’s primary communication tool for events, calendar items, notifications, and this newsletter as well as our student newspaper distribution. Constant Contact comes to you as an email but looks like a web page.

There are several links in each Constant Contact email that are very important. At the top of each email will be, in text, a link that states “If you are having difficulty viewing this e-mail click here.” Clicking that link will take you to a webpage that can display the message outside of your email program (Outlook, for example).

The second important link is located at the very bottom of each Constant Contact message. It allows you to opt out or unsubscribe from the Constant Contact emails. Please use this link ONLY if you really do not want to receive ANY Constant Contact emails. This action will prevent you from seeing vital current events involving your student’s time at Marist and once clicked, cannot be undone until the next school year.

PowerSchool is our primary school data information system. It stores all of your and your student’s contact, schedule, grade and transcript data permanently. The servers have the ability to email you directly and daily if you wish. They can send you current grades, current attendance data, lunch account balances and daily announcements. This information is dependent upon the accuracy of your e-mail address and the frequency is controlled by you via the PowerSchool login portal.

If you are new to PowerSchool or just want some additional information about how to use Power School effectively, please sign up for one of our webinars on PowerSchool over the summer. These will be listed on our main school website at Marisths.org as well as the PowerSchool website.

Direct Mass EMail We have the ability to directly email each address from our on-site server as a backup to ConstantContact. This is ONLY used if the information cannot be sent another way. There is no opting out of this like in ConstantContact. Some athletic teams, parent and support groups have lists of members set up so they can email that audience directly.

The Marist website is kept up-to-date on a daily basis, with announcements and changes that affect the entire student population. The site is available 24/7 for you and your student to utilize. All athletic schedules are available on the site through HighSchoolSports.net. School calendars are posted on the site and updated throughout the school year.

SchoolReach phone contact system is the tool we use to announce via a direct phone call to your home events, changes, important or time-critical information. The system is set up in “tiers” to allow the school administration to contact your home if there is a school cancellation or major change in schedule. We try to limit use of this method to announce new events.

One tier is reserved for critical school emergencies and is set up to call ALL available contact numbers for home, students and parents. This includes cell phones and business phones. This tier is ONLY used at the direction of the Principal and is ONLY for emergency school situations.

We can target a subset of students or parents for contact based upon the nature of the information and its urgency. Most calls are set to go out between 6:00 and 7:30 P.M. Beginning in September we will post the audio files of all SchoolReach messages on our website so you can listen at a later time.

I hope this helps to clarify how and why we use these multiple methods of communication with you, our families, students and friends at Marist Catholic High School.

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Jackson Bedbury

Pétanquers head to competition in California

A team of high schoolers from Eugene, including Marist freshman Jackson Bedbury, will be heading to San Rafael, California on July 17 and 18 to compete in the Junior National Pétanque Qualifier. They will go up against teams from around the country to earn the honor of representing the United States at the World Junior Pétanque Championship to be held next year in either Taiwan or Vanuatu!

The tools of pétanque are called boules.

Bedbury, along with two South Eugene High School students Carly Stasack and Rio O’Mary, will be coached by Ryan Baker (Marist Pétanque coach and French Teacher) and Mike Stasack (Churchill Pétanque coach and French Teacher). Best of luck to these junior pétanquers on their quest to compete at the highest level of the sport and to represent their country against over 85 other nations who play.

For more information on the game or to see when and where local pétanquers play, please go to the local Eugene club’s website or petanqueamerica.com.

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Marist frosh create “Elegance on a Budget”

Scarlett Frunz Nicole Jones Klayna Palacios Kaylee Postle Mandi Power

(Also from KMTR) Five Marist freshmen — Scarlett Frunz, Nicole Jones, Klayna Palacios, Kaylee Postle and Mandi Power — were the first Marist team to compete in the 3rd annual Willamette Valley High School "Chefolution" competition on May 15 hosted by Eugene School District 4J, Sodexo and Market of Choice. This year's cook-off, with a theme of "Elegance on a Budget," was held at South Eugene High School.

Six teams from all over the valley have just four hours to shop and whip up a three-course meal. They also had to do it for $50 or less.  The idea is for students to learn what it takes to make a meal from scratch, on a budget.

The participants said the biggest challenge wasn't the budget, but working together while the clock was ticking.

Mandy Power said "It can be a little bit of a challenge cooking with other people. But once you talk it over and get to know what everyone else is doing, you really understand what you're doing. And it's really fun working together."   

The teams were judged not only on the taste of their dishes, but on presentation, safety, and team spirit.

The Marist team earned the "Best Salad" award. Congratulations to our top chefs.

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Chris Deffenbacher, Registrar

Student and parent information from the Registrar's Office

Parents, please call Chris Deffenbacher, Marist Registrar at 541-681-5468 to update your student’s contact information whenever there is a change. During the month of August you will have the ability to update your student's and your contact information electronically. You can login to PowerSchool from your home and click on the "Update your information here" link on the main page. This link will CLOSE on August 31, 2010 and will not be available throughout the normal school year. Please let us know by phone or email after August 31, 2010 if there is any change in address, home or work phone number, place of business, email address, etc. This also includes second parent families who receive correspondence from the school. It is important that our information be current in order to stay in contact with you.

Be sure to let the school know if your student is leaving Marist to attend school elsewhere, (even if this decision is made during the summer between grade levels). There is a withdrawal process that must be completed in order to promptly forward records to another school.

For those students planning to get their first time instructional driving permits, the D.M.V. requires you to provide them with a Statement of Enrollment form (along with other forms of acceptable proof of identity. Get information on the D.M.V. website at oregondmv.com). The Statement of Enrollment form can be requested from the Registrar’s Office. Once you have your permit (even if you don’t get it the first time), the D.M.V keeps the form on file and you aren’t required to provide them with another one. The only exception to this is if you wait longer than six months to take the permit test again. You do not need the form to get your actual license, only the permit.

Please plan ahead if you have a summer birthday - request your Statement of Enrollment form before leaving for the summer break.

For graduating seniors, please remember that you will not receive your actual diploma at graduation. You must come to the Main Office between June 28 and June 30 or after August 1 to pick up the diploma packet which includes your diploma, a transcript for you to keep and your original immunization record among other items. We do not mail the diploma packet.

Also, if you change your mind about the college you asked me to send your final transcript to, be sure to call and let me know.

Thank you for your help in keeping our records up to date, and have a safe and happy summer!

Below are the final exam schedules for all students. Copies will be posted around the school and will also be available at the Main Office.

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Terrie Clemens, Administrative Assistant; Campus Ministry Assistant

Campus Ministry news

RETREAT TEAM - Selections were made for next year’s Retreat Team and Christian Leadership Class. At this time all 2010-2011 Retreat Team members are reminded of the mandatory Formation Retreat taking place September 18, 19 and 20 (Saturday through Monday). Information and registration forms will be available at the start of school in the fall.

This summer be attentive to daily living out your Christian calling! You are all in our prayers. We look forward to a great retreat year ahead.

CHRISTIAN SERVICE - Class of 2011: Thank you for your contributions to our local community this year. Your remaining service must be completed at the start of your senior year. Verification of your 50 hours of service and the 10 corresponding journal entries are due to Mrs. Ferrari by Monday, September 13th. The final Christian Service Experience requirements will be handled in senior theology.

Class of 2012: It’s time to put your Service Project Plan into motion. As members of the Marist community, we are called to serve those most in need. Summer is the perfect time to begin your service. Your first 10 hours of local service must be completed by the end of the first quarter (Nov. 5), and the two corresponding journal entries are due the first week of the second quarter (Nov. 8).

Contact Mrs. Julie Ferrari (541-284-7533); jferrari@marisths.org with any Service questions or inquiries.

Summer blessings from Campus Ministry!

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Tracy Muilenburg	Shari Pimental	Jerry Ragan

Counselors’ Corner

First of all, congratulations to all our Marist graduates! It has truly been a pleasure to work with you during your tenure at Marist and we wish you all the best in the future! Please keep in touch and stop by from time to time.

Mrs. Muilenburg has been working hard to meet with all the juniors to conduct their Junior Meeting. She has about 30 left to go and plans to meet with all juniors by the time we break for summer. Following this meeting notes are emailed to the student and his/her parent(s). If you do not receive these notes by the end of the school year, please contact her at tmuilenburg@marisths.org.

All Juniors have been reminded that they should use their time wisely during the summer to get a head start on the college application process. Many colleges post their application for the next school year in July or August. The Common Application (www.commonapp.org), which is used by about 400 schools in the United States, goes “live” on August 1. Before then, juniors should visit the Common Application website to work on a draft of their application.

Here are a few other things for all students to be thinking about:

• Summer is a great time for visiting college campuses.
• Summer is a great time for going online to research colleges and universities.
• Summer is a great time to begin looking at scholarship opportunities.
• Summer is a great time to find a community outreach activity in which you may have an interest.
• Summer is a great time to go on Naviance, take advantage of the surveys and career information it offers, as well as check out colleges and universities.
• Summer is a great time to do some reading for pleasure, especially non-fiction reading.
• ALL STUDENTS SHOULD UPDATE THEIR RÉSUMÉ ON NAVIANCE BEFORE RETURNING TO SCHOOL IN THE FALL. Teachers and counselors will use this information when writing a letter of recommendation next year.

If students spent five to ten hours out of the 1600+ hours in the summer, they would be taking great strides toward their long-term goals of attending college. Please continue to encourage them.

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Can you be a host family?

Ying Xia Yumeng Yao Ziyao Guo Tianyi Wang

LuAnn Langford, the Eugene-Springfield International Coordinator for Global Perspectives for Youth, announced today that Marist will have a number of new students from China this September. Each student is coming to Eugene to experience life as a member of the student body at Marist, and each will also need a loving family to host them for the year (late August 2010 until mid-June 2011).

The students will come to the United States with full medical coverage and a monthly allowance from their own family. Their American host families will receive a monthly stipend to assist with expenses. Additionally, each host family will receive support from LuAnn Langford, who will organize activities for the families and other students to network and socialize throughout the school year.

Ying Xia, from Wuhan, China, will be 17 years old when she arrives in Eugene to attend Marist this Fall. Her chosen English name is Helen. She is currently participating in a 10-month exchange program in Sandston, Virginia. Helen has an outgoing personality and she gets along well with her classmates and teachers. She describes herself as compliant, polite and hard working. At the age of seven, Helen’s grandmother began to teach her to play the piano and even now remains her greatest encourager. Her grandmother is the person that she admires the most and she is very grateful for her influence. Helen is now an accomplished piano player and enjoys performing for other people. She also likes drawing and writing, and has won prizes for them at her school. Reading is another of her interests. For sports, Helen loves playing badminton and basketball. Her teachers say she is a good student who is kind, cooperative and modest. Helen hopes to gain confidence and independence through her experience at Marist.

Yumeng Yao, also from Wuhan, is 16 years old. She is currently participating in a 10-month exchange program in Zillah, Washington. She will be a junior at Marist High School in Fall 2010. Her teachers say that she is fond of learning, an active girl and the one who always makes her teachers and classmates happy because of her pleasant personality. A talented girl with many interests, Yumeng loves painting, playing the piano, singing and playing basketball. She also enjoys Japanese cartoons and is good at drawing cartoon heroes. She was the president of the cartoon club in her school in China. Yumeng describes herself as outgoing, interesting, kind and playful. Her English name is “Polaris,” a name that she chose because like the North Star shining in the sky and showing people direction, she hopes that she can do her best to help other people. Polaris is eager to also help her new American host family understand more about Chinese culture, history and lifestyle during her time in Eugene.

Ziyao Guo, from Beijing, nicknamed “Kam,” will be 16 years old when he arrives in Eugene this fall to study as a sophomore. He would like to be involved in many activities in America, and is especially looking forward to the chance to play basketball for the school team! His teachers describe him as an honest, smart, outgoing boy who has a good sense of humor and is easy to communicate with. He is a good student who earns top grades and participates fully in his classes. Kam says that his strength is in never giving up in all that he does. He is interested in protecting the environment and helping people in the community. Kam was recently a volunteer English teacher at a primary school where the students and teachers appreciated his enthusiastic personality in the classroom and his confidence with his speaking skills. Kam’s new host family will learn first-hand about China as he shares his life and culture with them.

Tianyi Wang is a 16-year-old student who will be a sophomore at Marist this fall. He currently attends boarding school where he is active in organizing sports and activities for his class. He is the top student in his entire grade who earns straight A grades, excelling in all subjects but especially shining in math and science. Tianyi is happy to do community service and looks forward to contributing to Marist and the city of Eugene. He is interested in reading books, playing the saxophone, drawing and watching movies. He is the leading player on his school’s basketball team and his teacher says that he is the sports idol to many students. He hopes to be able to play basketball for Marist next year!

Tianyi greatly admires one of his past teachers, Ms. Long. Through her words and actions she demonstrated to him the importance of being a person of high moral character, honest and brave above all else. She also advised him to study diligently and he is very grateful for her guidance. Tianyi’s teachers describe his English reading, writing and understanding as excellent. He is outgoing, responsible, energetic, nice, popular, has good organizational skills and “sports star style.” He is humorous and often brings much fun to his classroom.

If you are interested in being a host family for any one of these exceptional young people, or would like to nominate another loving and caring family for hosting, please contact LuAnn Langford at 541-517-5915 or email at luannlangford@gpyinternational.org.

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Private School Exchange seeking host families

Contact John Thiel: john.thiel@earthlink.net

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Jerry Ragan, MVP Moderator

M.V.P. updates

(1) Project Starfish The objective of Project Starfish is to assist homeless families in the St. Vincent de Paul Connections program. This year's goal was to raise $9,000. There are two opportunities remaining to help and both happen on June 4:

• Student Karaoke Dance

• Personal donations collected in period 1 from students, staff and parents.

Many thanks to those who participated in the Papa’s Pizza Day on May 18th and to those who bought lunch at the Carl’s, Jr. Day on campus. A special shout out to Joe and Cathleen Karcher for their generosity in making the Carl’s Jr. Day a reality.

Below is the rundown of the events we have had so far. We need $2,066.33 more to hit our goal of $9,000.00. Note that the Personal Donations category is down, so please consider a one-time personal donation on Friday, June 4. Thanks so much!

(2) Clean out your desk project At the end of the school year, there will be collection boxes in the hallways for students and staff to place usable paper, notebooks, pens, pencils, binders, etc. These will be packed and shipped to mission schools in Central America.

Thank you for your generosity to all the Marist outreach efforts this year. Our faith calls us to respond to those in need and we have done our best to answer that call.

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Can you give an hour?

The Administration and Staff would like to thank our many Marist Library parent volunteers who have given of their time over the years to help with everything from book circulation to shelf dusting to helping our students with their Library questions.

Once again we are putting the call out to any parent who can give just one hour of your time, one day a week, during the 2010-2011 school year at midday (typically from 11:00 A.M. to noon) in the Library. This allows our regular Staff person to break for lunch.

If you have been a Library volunteer in the past and are able to help out again for the coming school year, or if you would like to become a Library volunteer, please contact Tony Huck at 541-686-2234 Ext. 2501 or thuck@marisths.org.

Thank you!

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LTD student transit pass information

The 2009-10 LTD Student Transit Passes remain valid for students in grades 6-12 through June 30, 2010.

This year Lane Transit District (LTD) will sell a Summer Youth Pass covering July and August to help families bridge the gap created when their students’ 2009-10 pass expires and before their 2010-11 pass becomes effective on September 1, 2010. The two-month pass will cost $35 and will be available for purchase in late June at the LTD Customer Service Center, located at the corner of E. 11th Avenue and Willamette Street. Call LTD Customer Service at 541-687-5555 for more information.

LTD will offer the 2010-11 Student Transit Passes beginning September 1, 2010, for students in grades 6-12. Interested families should look for program information in their back-to-school materials.

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