The spring season of 2017 will feature two new sports for junior high and high school aged students at Mount Royal Academy: girls softball and club rugby.
Girls softball came into existence thanks in large part to the advocacy efforts of interested student-athletes. The girls are already working on throwing and fielding drill in the St. Joseph gymnasium. The goal is to practice and then compete against local junior varsity softball teams in the Upper Valley.
The club rugby team is actually a cooperative between Proctor Academy, Kearsarge Regional High School, and Mount Royal Academy. ...
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Dear Families,
As many of you know, a pilgrimage by founding families of MRA to St. Joseph’s Oratory of Mount Royal in Montreal, the largest shrine in the world dedicated to St. Joseph, was a pivotal moment in the development of our school. Since its beginning, Mount Royal has been entrusted to the care of this saint whom God trusted to protect the Holy Family. Last Monday we celebrated of our school’s patron with Mass and a school wide lunch (thank you to our parent volunteers!). This feast is always a special day for our school, and yet another occasion during which we celebrate our Catholi...
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Dear Families,
Education, both public and private, has long been subject to ever-evolving trends that unanimously claim to be research-based. This causes educators, not all educators, to change the way they teach and how they assess what students are learning more frequently than not. Self-reflection and improving pedagogy and assessment to better reach students is of course a great practice, but changing so often that students suffer from a lack of stability can lessen effectiveness. Real transformation takes place over time, and only when the ultimate purpose of education infuses curric...
Dear Families,
I am sure we are all familiar with the Catholic cliches that surround the season of Lent. I find myself saying more frequently to my own children and our students, "offer it up" or "carry your cross" in moments of angst or tribulation. But all kidding aside, there is nothing superficial about these statements.
The readings for today set the tone for lent: if we want things to change, we need to focus on our own need to repent with a sense of urgency and authenticity that only seeks to please the maker of our hearts. There is no need to compare ourselves with others, but we do d...
Read MoreThe students of Mount Royal celebrated Catholic Schools’ Week with liturgical events, a schoolwide spelling bee, and two time honored traditions: a classroom door decorating contest and themed essay contest. Both contests were based on this year’s Catholic Schools’ Week theme: Mary, Queen of Peace and Mother of Hope.
Each year, every class from Pre-K through 12th grade attempts to produce the most creative interpretation of the Catholic Schools’ Week theme on their respective classroom door, and winners were announced at the conclusion of the week. In the elementary school, the 5th grade took ...
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Dear Families,
I am pleased to share with all of you that Mount Royal Academy was recently awarded the 2017 Eagle Times Reader's Choice Award for Best Private School (9-12). When I received the phone call from the newspaper communicating that we received the award, I was honestly quite surprised. I was unaware that such an award was given, and our high school is still a relatively new option for families in the Upper Valley Lake Sunapee Region. Back in 2009 when I first began teaching at MRA, there were barely 20 students in the high school. Now, we are approaching 60 total students, as w...
Dear Families,
Catholic Schools' Week was something I always looked forward to as a child attending diocesan schools in Manchester, and I love seeing that same anticipation in our students here at Mount Royal. The kids look forward to the annual traditions of the week, and it is important that we take this time as a school community to honor our mission of education and evangelization.
As we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the apparitions at Fatima and look forward to the diocese-wide consecration of Catholic schools to Our Lady in May, the faculty has chosen a Marian theme a...
Dear Families,
Today the Church celebrates the conversion of Paul. There is no otherliturgical event in which the conversion of a saint is honored, as the Churchtypically places the date of a saint's (or martyr's) passing into heaven as theopportunity to publicly recall the life of that saint.
There is a simple reason for this: Paul's conversion marked the moment whereinGod used a broken human instrument to carry the Gospel to all people, not justthe people of the old covenant. The most striking feature of Paul's conversionis the reversal of expectations: how could a pharasical, judgm...