Guest Bloggers: Mike and April

The Carola Home won the high school trophy for with least missing assignments!!
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!
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 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.
Big smiles from the Carola Home.

Struggles and dreams

I traveled to Lower Brule to join my fellow SCJs for lunch. I wanted to meet the two Sisters of Christian Charity, Anne Theresa and Marie Pauline, who just joined the pastoral team. Both have a lot of teaching and school administration experience. They are looking forward to a new ministry of focusing on the pastoral needs of the people on the Reservation.

Having done Indian reservation work myself for many years, I offered them two pieces of advice.

  1. Be patient (with yourself and others)
  2. Go visit (in people’s homes and in the community, so you understand both the struggles and the dreams)

Before I came home, I stopped at the Tribal Hall, and at the local convenience store/gas station. I ran into lots of St. Joseph’s alumni and families and caught up about how life is going now. When you live in a small town, a trip to the post office or store can take a couple of hours as you simply stop and pay attention to the people you know and meet along the way.

I was lazy, and had the high school students wash my car, but it was for a good cause. They had no classes today, and decided to have a fundraiser for trip next month to the Sioux Falls Arts Festival. They took lots of dirt, grime and bugs off many vehicles and raised $260.

When there are free days from school, our transition specialist will often invite groups on to campus to speak to our students about future plans. The National Guard came to our campus and spoke to five of our students who are considering become part of that service after they finish high school.