News

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of March 20, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL: Happy Spring! This past weekend's weather brought the sunshine and made it feel like winter may be behind us - my fingers are crossed! It was also a great weekend full of SJF fun:

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of March 13, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL: Last week's SAC/PTC Parent Information Night was a great opportunity for us to gather as a community, catch up on the events happening around our school, and to start getting ready for the 2023-24 academic year. Attached to this week’s SAM is the powerpoint presentation from the evening. Highlights included: 

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of March 6, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of February 27, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL: Welcome back to campus, SJF! Although the snow days last week were beautiful, it was so fun to see all the smiling faces returning yesterday morning. As we head into this week and with March starting tomorrow, here are a few events happening between now and spring break I wanted to make sure you had on your calendar:

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of February 20, 2023 FROM NORA JENSEN, SJF VOLUNTEER COORDINATOR: Volunteer Hours Check In We are now more than halfway through the school year and this would be a good time to record your volunteer hours. As a reminder families are required to fulfill 30 hours or 20 hours for new families. These hours are due by the end of the year and ideally a minimum of 10 volunteer hours would be associated with a fundraising activity (Cardinal Week of Giving or the Jog-a-Thon). As a reminder for each hour not filled, you will be charged $50. 

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of February 13, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  What a fantastic camping trip last week! Thank you families for all your support with our Cardinal Week of Giving. With over 77% family participation, we surpassed our goal and raised $129,000, meeting our match of $50,000! Congratulations to our top 3 classes for participation: Kindergarten at 100%, 3rd at 85% and 2nd at 79%. I would like to send a huge “Thank You” to Maddie O’Neill Andrews, our camp director, Katie Kennedy, our camp events coordinator, the spirit committee for making the week so fun for the kids and the numerous other volunteers that helped make this event possible. Go Cardinals!

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of February 6, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Yesterday marked our first day of “Cardinal Week.” With kids, faculty and staff in pajamas and crazy hair, I sure had some interesting tours yesterday as I brought around three families looking to join our community. Truly, the energy at SJF is alive not only for those within our school, but those wanting to be a part of SJF as well. Thanks for sharing the Cardinal Spirit around SW Portland!

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of January 30, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Happy National Catholic Schools Week! On behalf of the entire SJF faculty and staff, I would like to thank you for your commitment to your child’s Catholic education. As a mom of children in Catholic education myself, I recognize the time and financial commitment it takes to be an active member of the school and larger parish community. I wholeheartedly believe that the investment you make in your child’s educational career creates the platform for not only their academic foundation but more importantly a solid spiritual foundation. Thank you for being part of our family!

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of January 23, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Next week, Catholic Schools across our country will celebrate National Catholic Schools Week.  Each day I recognize the amazing opportunity that our school has to assist our families with the formation of our students, and to develop them into Active Christians, Engaged Learners and Responsible Citizens. Thank you for being our partner in their education!

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO -Everything You Want to Know Week of January 16, 2023 FROM THE CARDINAL CLUB:  WHAT IS CARDINAL WEEK? St. John Fisher's Days of Giving, Feb. 6th-10th! Our goal is to raise $120,000. WHAT IS CAMP CARDINAL? An auction party without the auction! Friday Feb. 10th at 6pm in the Corrado Center. This year's Cardinal Party is a Camp theme! Put on your favorite camp attire and celebrate with adult beverages, Mississippi BBQ and live music.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of January 9, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Safety for our students and families is our number one priority. In an effort to provide a safe environment for our students, as well as to accommodate the needs of our parent volunteers and visitors to St. John Fisher during school hours, we ask that you please follow the drop off/pick up protocols:

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of January 2, 2023 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!  I hope you all enjoyed the Christmas holiday with family and friends and are slowly settling back into the school routine.  Now that 2023 has begun, it’s time to start thinking about the 2023-24 school year:

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of December 12, 2022 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Happy 3rd Week of Advent!  As we continue to prepare our hearts, minds and homes to celebrate Jesus' birth, we have many events these final days of school before Christmas break.  Tomorrow night at 5:30pm is our band, glee and K-4 Christmas program in our church.  Students are asked to arrive at 5:00pm and report to the church. Dress for this fun event is Christmas/Sunday best clothing. See you there!

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of December 5, 2022 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  The second candle of the Advent wreath is lit this week symbolizing peace. Our students led our Advent Prayer Service on Monday at 8:15 with the theme of “waiting.” Waiting with a purpose, waiting for a reason and waiting in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ. We send our prayers that you and your family find peace this week and this Advent.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of November 28, 2022 FROM THE PTC LEADERSHIP:  Hello SJF Families, we hope you had a fun and special Thanksgiving! As we gear up for the holiday season and some exciting events over the next few months, we thought a quick summary of what the PTC is, what we do, and what our goals are, would be informative for our newer families and serve as a nice refresher for our longstanding ones. The PTC (Parent Teacher Club) is tasked with raising $140,000 annually that goes directly to the school budget. This money supports the school’s mission of educating the whole child, ensures that faculty and staff compensation aligns with the Archdiocese pay scale, and funds supplemental programs ensuring success for all SJF students. St. John Fisher’s tuition does not cover the actual cost to educate a student. For the 2022-2023 school year, the actual cost is $10,950, however,  the tuition is $8,250 for parishioners and $10,750 for non parishioners. The money raised by the PTC makes up for this discrepancy, contributing 5.6% of the school’s overall budget.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of November 21, 2022 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Please mark your calendar to attend our annual Parent Information Night on November 30th at 5:30pm. Each year SJF presents a speaker to engage parents on various topics. This year, we have Dr. Dean Moshofsky of Metropolitan Pediatrics. He will be discussing Resiliency and the many ways we can help our children develop this important trait. Dr. Moshofsky is very passionate about the importance of resilience and will be sharing ideas and strategies for kids of all ages.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of November 14, 2022 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Safety has always been a top priority for our SJF community.  Studies show that having students practice what to do in an emergency situation will help prepare them if/when an emergency situation happens. Therefore, we have a number of safety drills we conduct to keep our school safe.  

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of November 7, 2022 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Although we were just in shorts and t-shirts 3 weeks ago, this week's forecasted weather reminds us that winter has arrived. Here is a review of SJF’s inclement weather policies. You can also locate this information on page 15 of your Parent/Student Handbook (the little red handbook): Announcements concerning school closure and late starts are shared with families via parent email, posting on the SJF Facebook & Instagram pages, posting on the Announcements banner of your Family Portal on FACTS, and via the FACTS Parent Alert text feature. During inclement weather, keep the following points in mind:

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of October 31, 2022 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  Thank you so much for your partnership in attending our Parent/Teacher Conferences last week. With a 93% attendance rate between the 2 days, I would say we are doing a great job prioritizing communication between parents and teachers to help aid in the most successful experience for all our students. Thanks for making those days a priority for meeting with your child’s teachers. 

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT MEMO - Everything You Want to Know Week of October 24, 2022 FROM THE PRINCIPAL:  This Thursday and Friday are our parent teacher conferences. We are looking forward to meeting with each of you and appreciate you prioritizing these opportunities as we partner in the education of our students and community. We will be conducting our Kindergarten through 5th grade conferences in homeroom classrooms and 6th - 8th grade conferences in our Corrado Family Center. In order to receive your child’s progress report and STAR assessment scores, please check in via the school main lobby and then head to the homeroom classroom or Corrado Family Center for your conference(s). As we prepare for the Halloween festivities on Monday, we have a number of fun events planned: