Click here to sign up for our free daily newsletter.

PA schools celebrate World Catholic Education Week

May 14, 2012 | 5:01 PM

Catholic schools have a reason to celebrate this week.

It’s World Catholic Education Week and Prince Albert schools are organizing events.

Principal of St. Anne School, Kathy Gaudet said the week provides an excellent opportunity for reflection on their education system.

“It just makes us stop and think of the importance of it and I think we just need to continue doing that, highlighting it with our students,” she said.

Each school will get the chance to host a mass at one of Prince Albert’s parishes. The schools will also each have a celebration on Thursday, which Saskatchewan Bishops chose to recognize as World Catholic Education Day. The students at St. Anne’s will spend their ten minute prayer time in the morning with a specific focus on Catholic education throughout the world.

Gaudet said she’s looking forward to the celebration.

“It’s just great that we get to celebrate who we are and our faith with other people who believe and have the same beliefs as us, within our school and within our school community,” she said. “We can live that and it can permeate everything within our school.”

Dominic Fournier, a Grade 8 student at St. Anne School said he’s looking forward to the week.

“It helps you reconnect with God if you’re lost in life,” he said.

In Saskatchewan publicly funded Catholic education is a constitutional right. Over 35,000 students are currently in one of the eight Catholic school divisions throughout the province.

Fournier’s classmate Cassidy Jones said it means a lot to her to have a Catholic school system.
“I think it helps you get an awareness of the Catholic faith and helps you get closer to God,” Jones said.

Both Fournier and Jones plan to continue education at a Catholic high school. They said it provides a positive atmosphere.

“It would help us out a lot throughout the day knowing we have God looking down on us,” Fournier said.

This year also marks 125 years of Catholic education in Prince Albert.

news@panow.com