Author: St. Joseph's Indian School

At St. Joseph's Indian School, our privately-funded programs for Lakota (Sioux) children in need have evolved over 90 years of family partnership, experience and education. Because of generous friends who share tax-deductible donations, Native American youth receive a safe, stable home life; individual counseling and guidance; carefully planned curriculum based on Lakota culture and individual student needs and tools to help build confidence, boost self-esteem and improve cultural awareness. All of this helps children to live a bright, productive, possibility-filled future.

St. Joseph’s Indian School’s spelling bee

Fr. Steve and the kids participating in the Spelling Bee. — The Spelling Bee was challenging, but a lot of fun for everyone!

Our school gym was filled with our Native American students competing in the annual Spelling Bee. We have two sections of each grade, so earlier competition produced the three best spellers in each class. Fr. Anthony and I were the official word readers, and alternated between the grades. Spelling Bees tend to throw in some obscure and complicated words, some of which I had no clue what they meant or how to pronounce them. I was glad that Scripps sends along a definition and pronunciation guide. A few of the grades were quickly decided, but some went back and forth for many rounds. I felt sorry for the kids who knew how to spell the words but froze up in front of the crowd. A few of the younger students got a case of the giggles, which made it hard for them to concentrate. We cheered everyone on, win or lose. The winners now advance to the regional competition at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota.

I wandered around St. Joseph’s Indian School’s campus this morning checking out our building projects. Workers placed the 65 foot wooden beam on top of the Akta Lakota Museum expansion. Our own facilities crew is making steady progress on the Stevens and Matthias Home remodeling. One home is ready for the ceramic tiles to be laid in the bathroom and kitchen area. Even our heavy equipment garage is getting an upgrade – finally insulated after all these years. It will make it much easier to get the snow plow and tractor fired up on frigid mornings when they are most needed.

The Hogebach Home (high school girls) eat in shifts because everyone gets home from school, practice and work at different times. The houseparents filled me in on their comings and goings. As the students came home, I had a few moments to ask how each one was doing. Some of the students share readily and talk about many things. Others keep more to themselves. I try to engage them in topics I think they might want to share, listen attentively when they do speak and patiently accept the quiet when they don’t feel like saying much.

Student projects doing great

A couple interesting student projects of note. The William Home (4^th-5^th grade girls) has set a goal this quarter of 10,000 cumulative laps around the gym. Several mornings each week the home gets up early and goes out for a walk and exercise. They are keeping a thermometer on the door to the fitness room and coloring in their progress as they reach each new level. They’ve already passed the 3500 mark!

Gina’s computer class is spending a few minutes each day at the website Free Rice where fun quizzes increase their knowledge, make learning fun and educate them about hunger issue throughout the world. The students were talking about the activity even on the playground, so I knew it was a big hit.

Today was my day to run errands in town, to the bank and county building. While out, I stopped in to check on our folks downtown at our Thrift Store. With February around the corner, they’re redecorating with lots of red clothing for Valentine’s Day. The store is a great service to the community, and a good after school job opportunity for a few of our Lakota students.

St. Joseph's Indian School's cheeleaders. — These girls did a great job cheering on the basketball teams!

I ended the day in the gym, where our 6^th-8^th grade teams were in action. Besides the players, I cheer for our cheerleaders and encourage them to keep on improving. They had the help of our younger students, the 1^st-3^rd graders, who make up the pep club. This year they all have matching shirts that are St. Joseph’s basketball-style jerseys. They sure get both enthusiastic and loud when they start cheering. Half way through the games however, the time came for them to leave for supper, homework and bedtime. The gym quieted down considerably, but the action was still close and worth cheering for.

Carola Home Trip

The Christmas tree and decorations are put away.

The New Year’s resolutions have been made.

A group shot of the Carola Home on their skiing trip. — The boys had so much fun on their home trip to the Black Hills!

Now it’s time to get cracking with those books and getting through second semester. You would think the fun and exciting times would be over. That is not the case. This time of year for many homes here at St. Joseph’s begins with what we call the home trip.

Every year, each home on campus takes a home trip. Home trips are a wonderful time to relax and enjoy time together as a home without the stresses of homework, schedules and responsibilities. It’s a time to step out of the home routines and just be ourselves. It’s a time to get to know one another better and build friendships and relationships.

Two boys posing for a picture while on the slopes. — Derrik and Tommy stop for a picture while skiing.

We took our home trip this past weekend. The adventure took us to Terry Peak in Lead, South Dakota. This is the second year our home has made this trip. The boys enjoyed it so much last year that they voted to do it again this year. The boys have looked forward to this trip all year and now they have the memories.

We stayed in the beautiful Buffalo Trail Lodge. This is where the boys played in the snow, where they laughed at times, played games and watched movies.

The boys spent most of the two days skiing while others did snowboarding.

The boys had a lot of fun. They were very appreciative that donors help provide such an amazing experience. As one of the boys stated, “You guys are spoiling us!”

Students demonstrating our core values

Our morning prayer service to begin Catholic Schools Week was an opportunity for us to introduce our new strategic plan campus wide. Aaron, in our marketing department, filmed different events on St. Joseph’s Indian School’s campus, and created an effective visual of staff and students demonstrating our core values in everyday life – Faith, Collaboration, Integrity, Stewardship, Respect and Excellence. I’m proud to be a part of St. Joseph’s Indian School, and viewing the video with all our staff and students made me even more proud of what we are working on together as a community.

Before introducing the new vision and plan, I thanked everyone for the work they’ve done over the past four years to bring much of our current plan to fruition. The work we do now will lay a stronger foundation for future generations of students and staff, so that they can build on what we do today, and take St. Joseph’s forward in creative and exciting new ways.

All of St. Joseph's Indian School's youth durning Catholic Schools Week. — All the students smiling big during Catholic Schools Week.

After the staff went back to work, the students remained behind so we could take a school picture with everyone on the bleachers. Emily, our photographer, is good with the kids, and after everyone is well-behaved and she gets the pictures she needs, she lets everyone get a little wild for a fun snapshot, which the students love.

We had 5^th and 6^th grade basketball games after school against Crow Creek, which is the Indian reservation where perhaps 20% of our students are from. There were families in the stands rooting for kids on both sides of the ball. After the games, I was slated to visit Cyr Home (4^th-5^th grade boys) for supper. One of the students, Ben, invited his family to stay for supper, so the ranks were swelled by six more guests. Paula, the houseparent who was cooking, found out just a few minutes beforehand. She has learned to be very accommodating and flexible. She took out a container of leftovers, opened up a couple more cans of fruit, and served smaller portions, but it stretched around to satisfy everyone at the table and the family had a nice visit.

Some of our students see their families regularly. For others, it doesn’t happen all that often. But we try our best to make families welcome whenever they are able to stay.

Faith, Academics and Service

Today begins Catholic Schools Week, with the theme of Faith, Academics and Service. Today’s scripture readings lent themselves to a reflection on each of those. It’s not enough for students to be smart about their subject matter. What they learn needs to help them become people who understand God’s plan for them and find ways uniquely their own to serve the human family.

During the announcements at mass, I congratulated student achievements of all kinds. The high school one-act play took 2^nd place at the regions and the thespians will advance to the state competition in Aberdeen next week. Cassidy, one of our 7^th graders, has made the high school junior varsity gymnastics team. In only her 2^nd meet, Cassidy placed in several events and brought home a 5^th place overall. She was sitting up front with the choir, and when I mentioned her name, she got very embarrassed, but everyone gave her a big hand.

Cassidy may have appeared embarrassed at mass, but when I joined Pinger Home (6^th-8^th grade girls) for brunch, she brought down the gymnastics ribbon she won from the Hot Springs match to show me. When I first arrived at Pinger after mass, most of the girls were upstairs in the bedroom area cleaning. While the Pinger Home was just remodeled two years ago and still looks very new, that crew of girls may be the best cleaners we have, as the home looked spotless. But at least a couple of the girls chose the part of Mary rather than Martha, and shared hospitality as they sat to visit with me while Brian, the houseparent put the finishing touches on the food.

The leisure was short lived as most of the girls were off to play inter city basketball, and I headed home to make Sunday truly an appreciated day of rest.

Archery, wrestling and Saturday school

My Saturday was a quiet one in the office with homily preparation, letters and odds and ends. I did take a few breaks to go stroll around St. Joseph’s Indian School’s campus, for it is mostly a fun and relaxing day for our Lakota students. The bowling league was again in action at the alley, and our 1^st – 3^rd graders who are learning to wrestle practiced at the high school. Archery has begun again, and I watched the veterans from last year try to shake some of the rust off their aim. We also had eight more new students sign up so they can learn how to use bow and arrow!

One academic program though, is run by our high school support staff. “Saturday school” is required for students who have missing assignments, need tutoring or encouragement. Because the public school has a long weekend, many of our high school students took advantage and got checked out to spend some days at home. Pam only had one student to tutor this morning. But it did give her time to prepare information for summer camps and educational opportunities that she will also encourage the students to participate in.

A day of meetings for Fr. Steve

Today was mostly a meeting day. I began with the monthly reports from all the Development Office managers. Our use of media and technology changes at such a rapid pace these days. What fascinated me the most was the suggestion that we move toward having PURLS (personalized URLs) on our website, so when people visit us online, the kinds of stories and information they will see can be personalized. We have some creative, hard-working people in that part of campus, and I’m proud of the initiatives and forward ways of thinking they bring to work each day.

I walked over to the Akta Lakota Museum for our bi-weekly construction update. I imagine that sometimes meetings between architects and builders can get contentious, but ours have been working very well together. The change orders have been small, and work is steadily moving along. Right now it’s mostly welding, which doesn’t show up as big progress. But it’s like school for our kids. You have to get the basics down well, in order to move ahead later.

My management team discussed next week’s Catholic Schools Week and the presentation of our new strategic plan. (Read more here about last year’s Catholic School’s Week at St. Joseph’s Indian School.) We’re also looking at budgets and trying to prioritize capital expenses for next year, deciding what we can do and what has to wait.

When you’re a kid and don’t have to worry about shoveling snow or driving to work on icy roads, winter weather can be a lot of fun. The snow we did get is starting to melt, but made the slopes very slippery, and the kids were out in big numbers after school with sleds. Some dug tunnels through the big mounds of snow piled up by our grounds crew or played King of the Hill.

The Perky Home (4^th-5^th grade boys) invited me to supper. Afterwards I tried my hand (well, actually my foot) at hacky sack, but am definitely not limber enough to keep it going very long. What I was better at was helping some of the boys practice for next week’s spelling bee. In reading the words, I realized that there is a lot of vocabulary that our students don’t yet know.

Academic banquet at St. Joseph’s Indian School

Tonight we held our academic banquet for the first quarter. Students in grades 5-8 who made honor roll were able to invite a teacher, houseparent or counselor as their guest of honor. “Sports” was the theme, and you could see a wide range of colorful jerseys and uniforms as people showed off their favorite teams. Peanuts and popcorn were on the tables for appetizers, (of course, along with raw vegetables for better nutrition). The staff who served the meal dressed like ballpark vendors, and came by the tables with trays of hot dogs.

“Get your red hots!”

Shaya and her guest of honor. — The sports theme was enjoyed by all!

Our 1^st grade teacher Shelby wore her high school cheerleading outfit, which still fits!

For entertainment, Rob, one of our Family Service Counselors and I, reprised Abbot and Costello’s classic baseball routine “Who’s on First?” Our students had no experience of that, but as we made reference to St. Joseph’s team and pulled the students in with questions, we heard plenty of giggles. (I found out afterwards from Mary Jane, whose office is right next to mine, that she was concerned when she overheard us practicing. In the seven years, she never before heard yelling coming from my office!)

When we handed out certificates, the students also got a big foam #1 hand in either blue or yellow (our school colors). At the trivia contest afterward they waved them high in the air when they knew the answer.

I grew up near Chicago listening to announcer Harry Caray who was fond of saying, “You can’t beat fun at the ballpark,” but school can be pretty fun as well. We sure had a festive evening of laughter celebrating these students’ school achievements and cheering them on so they set big goals and pursuit their dreams.

“Bishop, can I see your bling-bling?”

Bishop Robert Gruss at St. Joseph's Indian School. — Kathleen, Bishop Robert Gruss and Fr. Steve examining a science experiment.

Rapid City Bishop Robert Gruss, who was just ordained Bishop six months ago, visited us today for the first time. While we are located in the Sioux Falls Diocese, more of our students are actually from West of the Missouri River and in his diocese. As he travels, and people hear he works in South Dakota, countless people have asked him if he knows St. Joseph Indian School, and he was very interested in discovering more about our school and programs. I accompanied him for almost five hours and enjoyed the company of a kind and faith filled shepherd.

I gave the lengthy, deluxe campus tour. In the Akta Lakota Museum, Vickie shared how we provide a place for visitors to learn about the history and culture of the Lakota (Sioux) people. Frank, our 6^th– 8^th grade residential coordinator gave the Bishop a tour of the Rooney Home and explained everything from student chores and laundry schedules, to security measures in the homes, to our four tiered phase system, where students can earn more privileges as they make progress on their personal goals.

We stopped at the Health Center where Nancy, Ronda and Connie look after the health care needs of our students.

Fr. Anthony put together a school wide prayer service. The Bishop told our Native American students about his growing up years, and reminded them that God has a plan for each of them. He used the image of a jigsaw puzzle where we don’t see the big picture until its complete – but prayer helps us to see God’s hand in all things as we grow.

Our Chalk Hills Singers drum group sang a honor song, and our Powwow Royalty presented him with a picture of our student body and a snow globe replica of our Lady of the Sioux Chapel.

Bishop Robert Gruss showing the Lakota (Sioux) student's his "bling-bling". — The Native American student's admiring the Bishop's "bling-bling".

While we were shaking hands with the students outside of chapel, the line that made me laugh the most was when one of our students saw the golden chain connected to the Bishop’s pectoral cross inside his shirt pocket.

“Can I see your bling-bling?” he asked!

We sat with a group of 5^th grade girls in the dining room for lunch. That crew is usually very talkative, but it took them a little while before overcoming shyness around a stranger and eventually opened up.

Julie gathered four of our family service counselors who talked about the backgrounds of our American Indian students and their families and issues they face. Bishop Gruss asked lots of good questions to help him understand the people he is serving.

Kathleen, our principle, led us on a tour of the school. Brock demonstrated one of our smart blackboards. The third graders in Native American Studies class demonstrated both traditional powwow and hoop dancing. Bishop Gruss let out a big laugh when one of the songs the kids danced to was “Old Macdonald” sung in 49er powwow style.

We ended the day in the Development Office, for a tour of the work our staff does there, and some coffee and cookies. Next time someone asks the Bishop if he knows St. Joseph’s Indian School, he’ll have some good memories and a good sense of what we’re all about.

A part of St. Joseph’s Indian School

I spent most of the day working on finances and budgets, not too exciting but necessary to keep things running well. Thankfully we have such good and dedicated people in the Development Office that think ahead. Much of our discussion right now is planning for a future where postage costs are going to be higher and services probably curtailed. Since anyone reading this blog is already internet friendly, we really see this as a continued opportunity. While online giving grows every year, many of our donors are still more comfortable with standard mail, so a gradual transition will take some time. Instead of taking months to design, print and mail a newsletter, we can have a photo and article posted online the next day. It can save us both time and money and get interactive updates out in a timely way.

We want folks to feel a part of what happens on St. Joseph’s Indian School’s campus, even at a distance.

In the evening I talked with Daylon and Erica, high school students chosen to speak at our donor luncheons in Miami on March 21 and April 1. They were both incredibly excited and look forward to meeting and thanking our donors in that area, and sharing some of their experiences at St. Joseph.

I also stopped in the Carola Home (HS boys) to visit the walking wounded from the ski trip. I think their egos were bruised as much as muscles, but they are eager to try again!