Catholic Schools Week is supposed to be a week where all Catholic Schools try to show their students and faculty why they should be there, and not in a public school.  It’s supposed to be a fun week that people will be able to remember when looking back on their time spent at JC.  Unfortunately, JC hasn’t quite mastered the art of this yet.

Coming from St. Margaret’s Elementary and Middle School, I thought Catholic Schools Week was a close second to Christmas break.  It was a week where we were in school, but we didn’t even mind.  Every day was a new, fun activity.

One day was couch potato day where we would all come in our pajamas and we would watch a movie and eat popcorn in the gym.  Another day was grandparent’s day and  we would involve our grandparents in all of our classes, instead of just having them sit in.

During my freshman year, I didn’t even realize it was Catholic Schools Week.  It came and went without me even noticing anything was different.

As my years have gone by at JC, it definitely has seemed like the school is trying to make more of an effort.  This year was definitely the best Catholic Schools Week so far. Some of my favorite things of the week were grandparents visiting and giving cupcakes to all of the students on Student Appreciation Day.

I like the fact that we invite our grandparents to come and visit for a day.  Every time I see my grandparents they always ask me “how’s school?” and “how are all your teachers?”  Now they don’t have to ask me that because they can form their own opinions.

The giving out of cupcakes was a great way to get students excited about Student Appreciation Day.  Who doesn’t like cupcakes?

One thing that we have to work on for Catholic Schools Week in the future is Teacher Appreciation Day.  I think that each class officer should get together and hold an assembly with each of their classes.  They should come up with ideas to honor their teachers that day.  For example, we could put together a lunch for them.  I think that the teachers work so hard for us every day, so why not take one day and really honor them right?

Another thing that we have to work on is Student Appreciation Day.  We should all be able to come in in sweatpants, and go into the auditorium two classes at a time and watch a movie of our choice.  We can choose what movie we would like to watch, and then teachers can hand out popcorn.

Slowly but surely, Catholic Schools Week is improving, but it still isn’t as fun and alive as I think it could be.

Amanda Graziano is an Opinion Editor for The Patriot and jcpatriot.com.