Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God. Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Phil 4:6-7



Wednesday, August 24, 2016

H.S. House System


When we attended the open house at the high school where Faith is starting her first full day with all freshman, sophomores, juniors, and seniors today, I was really impressed by one aspect of the school that I had never heard of (well, not in real life). It is the House System. Those of you who are familiar with the HP books know what I'm talking about, but short of that example, I had never heard of it. I could liken it to a system of academic college fraternities -- that's really the closest example.

Wednesday is always "House Day" at BHHS, and students wear a uniform different from their normal -- instead of Faith's navy jumper and white blouse, she'll wear her House uniform -- a khaki skirt and green Aquinas polo. Faith is in Aquinas House (pardon the blue headband -- it makes her look bald! She decided to put her hair up in a bun today -- must have been a popular style yesterday!).





Rather than try to explain the purpose and function myself, I am copying from the school's website:


Our innovative House System is a hallmark program for Bishop Hartley High School. The creation of the program began seven years ago when a team of Hartley administrators, faculty and staff led the charge to create an environment where every student felt at home. They wanted to ensure all students had a support system, healthy peer relationships, people to turn to with questions, great adult role models, and a place to be themselves. That effort led to the creation of Bishop Hartley’s House System. Every house contains members of the faculty and staff to mentor and provide pastoral care to all our students. In each of the six houses, there are approximately 120 students. Split into six mentor groups (five students from each grade for a total of 20 students per mentor group), students meet with their mentor teacher/group every day. 
The primary purposes of the House System are to further the mission of the school by providing greater pastoral care to all our students, training and guiding our students to become leaders and strengthening our sense of community. Each student is assigned to one of six houses. Our House System assures that each student is embraced in the “Hartley Family Spirit” while recognizing them for their individual gifts and talents. Our program enables us to strengthen the partnership of school, student, and parent in the development of each child that walks through the doors of Bishop Hartley. No matter what house a student belongs, we are all Hawks committed to furthering the mission of Christ both in our community and in the world.
At Hartley, we believe it is imperative for students to gain not only knowledge in high school but also real world skills to be successful. One of the most critical skills is leadership. With the House System’s focus on developing leaders, the House Program was expanded in 2014 to include a unique leadership curriculum.  Bishop Hartley is the only school in the Dioceses to offer an approved leadership curriculum for which students earn graduation credit.
While integrating many of the roles of our previous student government system, the House System provides more leadership positions than that of a traditional student council model. Students can serve in more than 100 school leadership positions, including: School Captains, School Vice-Captains, Senior House Captain, Junior House Captain, Sophomore House Captain, Freshman House Captain, House Chaplain, and House Service Coordinator.

There are six houses, all named after Catholic high schools in Columbus that have since closed their doors. The house Faith was placed in, Aquinas House, is named after Aquinas HS, where her great grandfather attended school.

I am very impressed with the concept of the House System, their service projects and and opportunities to pull together and work as a group. High school can seem like a very big place where you could get lost, and this system helps the school make each student feel like an important individual to the group as a whole. I think making a big school smaller is always a good thing. Do you have a House System in your child's high school?

As an aside, Faith was very excited to come home yesterday and tell me that she met another girl who had been homeschooled her "whole life, too!" She says they are destined to be best friends!


19 comments:

  1. Cool that she found a friend! My kids' HS does not have houses, but I suspect it's a smaller environment that Faith's school. I'm still trying to get a bead on total enrollment. I think that in a large school, a house system is a very good idea for the reasons you mentioned.

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    1. By comparison, Faith's HS is smaller that the HS the boys went to but just by a little bit.

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  2. They have about 120 in each class, I believe. We have only four Catholic co-ed high schools here, and one all-boys' school (where the boys went).

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  3. Thank you for introducing me to something I have never heard of...and wholeheartedly support. How beautiful are the hands and feet of Christ! A beautiful picture of faith in action!

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    1. Like all schools, BHHS has its issues, but "faith" and "service" are pillars of the school's missions and they do work hard at it.

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  4. That sounds wonderful! I just showed this to Olivia and she replied that she wished something like had been in place in her HS.

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    1. My HS was enormous -- probably three times the size of Faith's HS. I wish we'd had something like this, too. For that reason I felt completely at home when I joined a sorority at Ohio State (with its 60,000 students).

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  5. My HS was 2100-2200 back in the day. (This was before the schools split.) My class had around 560 kids in it. But I knew that going in. I went from parochial school to public school, and I was really tired of being with the same 60 kids for the past 9 years! What made PHS seem smaller to me was that my friends were all in the same things as me--drama, choir, my other classes, etc. Extracurriculars really helped a lot. And I'm still close friends with the same people, 16 years later, so that's something.

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    1. You're right. Extracurriculars do help the big factor. Faith doesn't have plans yet to pick up an extracurricular (at least this year) because she wants to continue dance, so the House System is really good for her. And the fact that she's coming from home...

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    2. Choir was HUUUUUGE for me. It helped that the Freshman choir was big, so I was able to meet a lot of people right off the bat. I think we had 100 some people in it. So it was easier for me to connect faces with names in my other classes, etc. I love the house system idea, though. It's one of my favorite parts of HP. Hufflepuff pride :)

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  6. How wonderful! It sounds very much like the Household structure at Franciscan University of Steubenville when one of my kids was there.

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  7. I was thinking the same thing, Nancy. It sounds like a great program, Barb! God bless!

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    1. It's possible the system was modeling after Franciscan's -- BHHS was the first Catholic high school in Columbus to do it, and I think there's only one other.

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    2. St. Agnes in St.Paul is starting the House system this year. Alas, we had to move out of state, where we found ourselves battling a certain "Wellness" program in our local Catholic HS. Arggghh. Leaving one kid in to finish his senior year, pulled the sophomore over to the public HS, where there seems to be more respect for us as parents and for our faith, ironically. These are our tail-enders, after putting 5 other kiddos thru Catholic schools. Ever vigilant, but just too tired to fight anymore.

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  8. The two high schools that my oldest 4 attended both had house systems. The 2nd one had special t-shirts on Wednesdays and were named for Saints. The first one had special ties because they wore ties every day, and had Latin names, but I don't remember what they were. I think it was executed in the former school, and helped the kids feel at home. I don't remember competitions at that one, but that could just be because Tom was a boy (not a talker).

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  9. Andrew had this at Franciscan U. I love that Faith has found a new friend! From Elisa

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  10. I've been thinking and praying for you all. She looks great! Hope you are doing okay :)

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  11. I'm so glad she met another homeschooler! I asked M if he knew anyone in his homeschool group who is going to Hartley this year to see if he knew Faith's new friend. He said no! About to post on his first day of school. It was very positive. And I cried a little lol.

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I appreciate your comments -- sometimes I feel like I'm talking to myself!