CSAC Pizza Lunch: Volunteers Needed Please

The next CSAC pizza lunch is on Friday, April 26th.

Volunteers (from 11:15am until noon) are always needed and much appreciated. Please contact the school if you are able to help out at any of our pizza lunches. Thanks.

April 22nd CSAC Budget Meeting Reminder & Agenda

Your Catholic School Advisory Council (CSAC) next meets at 6:30 PM, on Monday, April 22nd. This is an important, budget focused, CSAC meeting and your opportunity to vote on CSAC's expenditures towards education and parent engagement improvement at St. Agnes this school year.

The meeting starts at 6:30 PM, sharp, and will conclude by 8:30 PM. The Meeting's Agenda is posted on our blog (under the Key Documents area - or just click here for a copy)

As always, we encourage all St. Agnes school parents to attend this and every meeting of your CSAC. See you then!

Talking to Your Kids About Money

The following article appeared in the April 17, 2013 Business section of the Toronto Star. It's provided here too since the topic of financial literacy education for kids was identified as being of interest to our parent community.

Financial Literacy: A day dedicated to teaching your kids about money

By Morgan Campbell

A new poll from BMO Financial group finds that 96 per cent of Canadian adults surveyed believe it’s important for parents to talk to their children about managing money.

But that same poll finds that only 18 per cent of respondents have actually had those conversations with their kids.

To turn parents’ good intentions into action BMO teamed with the non-profit Canadian Foundation for Economic Education to make Wednesday “ Talk With Our Kids About Money Day.”

“Between what we think and how we behave there is indeed a distance and a disconnect,” says BMO Nesbitt Burns chairman Jacques Menard. “Parents spend more time talking to their kids about school and about their hobbies…than they talk about money.”

More than 400 schools across Canada will take part in the program, and BMO estimates at least 50,000 Canadian children will talk to a parent or teacher about financial literacy.

To jumpstart the initiative experts from BMO and CFEE offered a few tips on teaching your kids to think about money.

Inclusion is Key

If you’re having a garage sale this spring, invite your kids to set up their own table and sell their old trinkets. Allow them to keep the proceeds, but make sure you talk to them about what to do with the money.

“There’s something that might have just passed as an average day in the family,” says Alyson Schafer, a parenting expert and contributor to the initiative. “(But it’s also) a financial literacy lesson for their kids.”

Birthday Budget I

If you’re planning a birthday party for your child, set a budget and include him or her in discussions about how to apportion the money. This way, your children will realize money is a finite resource while also learning to prioritize. If the budget doesn’t allow for a giant cake and helium balloons, your son or daughter will have to figure out quickly which one is more important.

The Bucket List

Teach them to visualize different types of savings goals by having them draw three buckets into which their money will flow. Bucket number one is for short-term goals, Number two is for longer-term objectives, and the third is for RESPs.

Birthday Budget II

Instead of buying your child a toy or video game as a birthday gift, why not buy stock? Serge Pepin, BMO Asset Management’s VP of investment strategy, suggests buying a few shares of a company like McDonald’s or Disney. The objective is to use a company your children recognize to help familiarize them with investing and the stock market.

But Keep It Simple

Pepin says it isn’t necessary to introduce kids to much besides savings and stocks. Flooding young people with information with information about hedge funds and derivatives won’t necessarily make them more financially literate. Pepin says it will probably do the opposite, confusing them and turning them off of the topic.

“You don’t want to create a scary or confusing environment for kids,” he says. “Create a fun and interactive environment and invite in some simple concepts.”

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CSAC Budget Meeting (Date Change)

Please note that your Catholic School Advisory Council's (CSAC) next meeting date has been changed. It will now be on Monday, April 22nd (previously scheduled for Tuesday, April 23rd).

The meeting, in the school's library, starts at 6:30 PM, sharp, and will finish by 8:30 PM.

This meeting is a particularly important budget focused meeting. It is your opportunity to provide input (including vote) on CSAC's spending on education support and parent engagement improvements for our school in this school year.

We look forward to seeing you there.

Gators Ice Hockey, a Fantastic Success

At a time when the families and staff of Toronto’s largest School Board (TDSB) continue to struggle with the challenges of cancelled extra-curricular school activities, stemming from that Board’s difficult and on-going contract talks, we can’t help but reflect on how fortunate we are at St. Agnes, to have parents and staff so fantastically supportive of extra-curricular activities. There are many recent examples of these, our boys and girls basketball, teams, indoor soccer team, co-ed ice hockey team and our participation in the upcoming TCDSB Music Festival are just a few examples that come to mind.  Let’s remember to thank our school staff when we get a chance, for exposing our kids to all of their great developmental experiences.

As you’ll know from reading recent posts to our CSAC Blog, we’ve been following the volunteer efforts of school parents and staff and the success of our revitalized (after a 23 year absence) St. Agnes Gators co-ed ice hockey team.  Our Gators recently competed in the second and final TCDSB tournament of the year at York University. We tied for 1^st with two other teams but the tie-break guideline prevented us from moving on to the finals. We can all be extremely proud of the team’s results and how everyone involved proudly represented St. Agnes school spirit and sportsmanship throughout this year’s tournaments.

This hockey team was just another great St. Agnes experience for our students. Brendan Dwyer volunteered to write a letter on behalf of the team, relaying his great experience playing for the Gators:

For the first time in twenty three years St.Agnes had a hockey team. If it weren't for Mrs. Cooke we would not have been on the ice. My experience playing with friends or grades higher than us was fun, although it was hard to keep up with the good guys. So we had three practices and we did scrimmages to see how we should make up lines. When it came down to the tournament that was the best part. When we woke up at 6:00 in the morning I was excited to play. But we did not win a game on our first day, we tied and lost games. So then we waited up to the next tournament day. This was better, we won three times, tied once and lost two. One game we won 7-0! It was fun at the tournament.

 

A special thanks to Mr.Cooke, Mrs.Cooke, Mr.Shea, Mr.Ennis and my Dad for making the team and coaching. I can’t wait until next year because we will make it to the playoffs!

 

St. Agnes Gators 2013

 

Well said Brendan. Our students always do us proud!