Last week, St. Joseph’s Indian School hosted a Mission Education Conference for members of the Priests of the Sacred Heart and our co-workers. Large contingents came from Wisconsin and Mississippi, and others from Texas, Illinois and even two from our sister school in Handrup, Germany.
An excellent and full article on the events, complete with many pictures can be found here. Be sure to look at the “I am Dehonian because. . .” statements!
I was so proud of the work and planning our staff put into the snowstorm-abbreviated conference!
Our Lakota students were also excited to have visitors tour the classrooms and take part in the interactive class lessons planned specially for the day.
Our guests had to leave after only one day because of the record-setting storm that was on its way. As a result, second day activities had to be cancelled. Our students were very disappointed they didn’t get to give cultural demonstrations they practiced for – archery, hand games, drum and powwow dancing – because school was canceled during the snowstorm. One student was actually disappointed to have a snow day, which says something about the excitement generated with visitors on campus!
An entertaining way of informing our guests about the nature of the work at St. Joseph’s was the production of “commercials” from each department. Each of our departments came up with a presentation, video or skit that gave an overview of their part in the mission. Our staff shared their passion for their work with both creativity and humor.
Foster, head of the grounds crew, got out his guitar to do a fun spoof of Johnny Cash’s song “I’ve Been Everywhere.” The facilities crew brought down the house with a clever and imaginative overview of the work they do:
Oh we can: oil it boil it lift it tease it, weld it broom it whisk it fleece it
Shine it buff it wax it grease it, wrench it bench it, max it freeze it
Borrow it buy it sell it lease it, Good Lord help me I can’t stop or cease it
REFRAIN: We can do anything ma’am, we can do anything ma’am
No matter the time or hour, we have got the power
To make it all better, we can do anything
So as you walk around our campus here you’ll notice it looks fresh and green
The buildings look strong and stout, the windows fixed, the floors are clean
We’re proud to be a part of St Joe’s and I want to know as far as facilities goes…..We can do anything!
As we ended the conference at supper with some of our Wisconsin confreres, they were most disappointed the reservation tour got canceled due to highway closures. We told them it was a good excuse to invite them back another time.
