St. Joseph School, affiliated with the Dominican Sisters and an integral part of St. Joseph Parish in historic Mission San Jose, is dedicated to providing a strong Catholic religious formation and an excellent academic education for transitional kindergarten through 8th grade students. Partners in this endeavor, students, parents, educators, and parish community strive to live Christ’s message, empowering service-minded future leaders for Church and community.

To the St. Joseph Community,

Our school wide theme this year is “Unity.” Specifically, it is “Unity by Grace.” As the quote above shares, when we work together, students, teachers and parents, in collaboration we can achieve amazing things for the good of the entire community. Thank you to the members of our community that come together to share creative ideas, problem solving strategies and manpower. Alone is hard but TOGETHER is better!

A Prayer for Unity

Dear Father,

Just as it was when Jesus made his home on earth,

the world can be a hateful and cruel place.We ask that

you would guide our actions as believers. Give us an

eagerness to be humble and gentle. Help us have hearts

of patience and forbearance.Thank You for the hope we

have in You. May Your hope unify our thoughts and decisions

and invoke peace through the Spirit.

Amen

Please remember that this Friday, September 4th is a 12:15 dismissal. Enjoy a healthy and safe Labor Day 3 day weekend. We will see you back on Zoom Tuesday, September 8th.

Peace and God Bless,

Patti Calton

SJS Principal

The packets given out during the Meet and Greet contain the forms that all families are required to complete each school year. Please be sure to get them turned in ASAP - they were due by yesterday, September 1st. You may drop them by the office during office hours, fax them to 510-656-3608 or email them to Mrs. Marron, cmarron@sjsmsj.org.

While the Kline Library has been downsizing to eventually be a classroom, there are over 6,000 books available, free of charge, for our students!

Here are the steps to check out a book:

1. Check out the online library by visiting https://opac.libraryworld.com

1. Library Name: Kline Library

2. There is no password

2. Find 1-2 books that you would like to borrow

3. Email lkaefer@sjsmsj.org these 3 things:

1. Book Title

2. Author

3. Student name and grade

4. Pick up your books selection at school!

1. The book cart will be outside of the main office from 7:30am-4:00pm.

2. Please allow 24 hours from when your email was sent to give Mrs. Kaefer and/or Sister Denise to prepare your book selection(s).

3. Remember to follow all safety precautions while on campus and wear a mask when picking up.

5. Books can be checked out for 2 weeks and must be returned to the Return Box outside of the office before the due date.

6. If you would like to renew a book for another 2 weeks send an email to lkaefer@sjsmsj.org, but it must be returned after 1 renewal in order for others to check out.

*Returned books will be “quarantined” for 3 days and sanitized before returning to the shelf for the next patron to borrow.

We hope to be very busy keeping the books circulating! Watch for Book Reviews and Suggestions in the Smore newsletter to help you choose titles. And there will be information about what may be happening with an Accelerated Reading Challenge!

We look forward to hearing from you…

S. Denise, your School Librarian, and Mrs. Kaefer, her Volunteer Librarian-Aide

Thank you to everyone who came to picture day last week. The photographer will be emailing you soon with instructions on how to access the proofs and place your order online. We will notify you when the orders are ready to be picked up at school.

As we try to get back to some sort of normalcy, one tradition continues as we celebrate 25 years of the St. Joseph School Golf Tournament. We will be having the annual golf tournament at The Club at Ruby Hill on Monday, October 5, 2020. Because of the restrictions of COVID-19, there will only be a golf tournament and not a dinner portion this year. Auction items will be online on a new website. We are seeking sponsorships, golfers, donations, and volunteers. If you can help in any of those areas, please go to the link below or contact Mr. Hashimoto (shashimoto@sjsmsj.org) with any questions.

A big THANK YOU to Mr. Allan Bernales for overseeing the ordering and installation of the plexiglass in the office and room 8. We appreciate all of your hard work and the decoration in the corner as well!

We want pictures of your kids at Meet and Greet, on the first day of instruction, in their Zoom classes, in their uniforms, coming to picture day, etc... We have set-up a new email just for sending pictures to the school to be used in the yearbook, newsletter and possibly promotional materials. Please make sure to put your child's name in the title of the picture and let us know what they were doing. Thank you for participating in this! The email to send your pictures to is;

pictures20@sjsmsj.org.

Scrip is an easy way to generate much needed funds for our school. We ask all school families to purchase at least $200 worth of Scrip per month - what most families spend on groceries each month - if at all possible. You may use the form, attached below, to place and order in the office or you may use shopwithscrip.com. Orders will be filled each week and may be picked up in the school office.

Dear SJS Families,

I pray that the new school year finds you healthy and as happy as you can possibly be!

We continue to do the work necessary to make the playground project a reality. It has been nothing short of a battle, magnified further by the shutdown of City of Fremont offices due to the Covid 19 pandemic. However, we continue to overcome each of the obstacles presented on a weekly and sometimes daily basis.

In summary, after almost a year of revisions, meetings, and telephone conversations, we were thrilled to finally receive conditional approval from the City of Fremont’s Planning Department for the wall portion our project on May 12. After revising the plans in response to the approval conditions presented, we submitted the application for the Building Permit on July 20. In addition, throughout the summer, we’ve been communicating and meeting with contractors to get bids and ultimately received a proposal that is within our budget. At present, we are waiting for official word on the status of our building permit application. This information was due on August 10, and after a number of attempts to get an update on the status, we have received unofficial word that indicates that the City is requesting further revisions and additional information.

This has been an unbelievable and frustrating process, requiring more time and funding than we could have ever imagined, but we are staying the course to ensure that our new playground becomes a reality for our students. If you are connected with the City of Fremont’s Building Department would you please contact me (kmendoza@sjsmsj.org)?

Thank you,

Mrs. Kelly Mendoza

Volunteer Playground Project Coordinator