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TORONTO - The key to a successful school, says principal Dianne Parwicki, is a strong partnership between parents, the school and the community,

“Leadership means building trust between parents and the school,” said Parwicki, who was honoured for her leadership with a Principal of Excellence Award by the Toronto Association of Parents in Catholic Education.

Parwicki, principal at Toronto's Fr. John Redmond High School, was honoured along with Toni Mayer, principal at Toronto's Holy Spirit Elementary School. 

TORONTO - An all-girls Toronto Catholic high school is looking to raise $20,000 this school year to help sustain South Sudan������Ƶapp first secondary school for girls.

“We are trying to raise enough funds to help (the Loretto Sisters) open that school so young women can continue to be educated,” said Loretto Abbey High School principal Alda Bassani.

Toronto������Ƶapp Loretto Abbey is partnering with another Loretto Abbey in Dublin, Ireland, to raise funds for the Loreto Secondary Boarding School in South Sudan. The school is run by the Irish province of the Loretto Sisters, also known as the Institute of the Blessed Virgin May (IBVM). Students and staff will be donating proceeds from charity events throughout the school year. Planned so far are a pasta night, Christmas concert and multicultural event.

TORONTO - The Toronto Catholic District School Board voted unanimously to look into creating the board������Ƶapp first independent ombudsperson.

Vice-chair Jo-Ann Davis, who sponsored the motion at the Nov. 24 board meeting, said an independent ombudsperson would “ensure further transparency” and a system that������Ƶapp “responsive and accountable.”

The TCDSB policy and governance committee will be looking into the motion and will be inviting experts to speak on the issue, she said.

TORONTO - Canadians' support for the only Catholic university in the former Soviet Union — which was recently backed up by a $1.2 million donation from businessman James Temerty — sends a strong message that promotes democracy and religious freedom in Ukraine, said Fr. Borys Gudziak.

“After the Orange Revolution hit, we had very high hopes for fully democratic prospects of an independent Ukraine,” the rector at Ukrainian Catholic University told The Catholic Register while in Toronto as part of a six-week tour of Canada, the United States and some European countries.

“We have (since) turned towards authoritarianism and some politically motivated trials.”

The Niagara Catholic District School Board and King������Ƶapp University College at the University of Western Ontario have signed a partnership agreement to promote the life-long process of Catholic education. 

The partnership reflects the Niagara Catholic board������Ƶapp focus on “building a strong Catholic identity and community to nurture the distinctiveness of Catholic education,” said John Crocco, the NCDSB������Ƶapp director of education.

Crocco said the agreement will provide faith formation for the adult faith community at King������Ƶapp College and the Niagara Catholic board, including individuals at the diocesan level.

MISSISSAUGA, ONT. - Teachers should address homophobia in Catholic schools and embrace the objective of gay-straight alliances, two presenters told delegates at a major education conference.

Kevin Welbes Godin, chair of the Catholic Association of Religious and Family Life Educators, and co-presenter Dave Szolloy, religious department head at Scarborough������Ƶapp Mother Teresa Catholic High School, said GSAs are necessary to combat bullying in Catholic schools. They were speaking to about 30 teachers Oct. 28 at the When Faith Meets Pedagogy conference.

MISSISSAUGA, ONT. - Catholic teachers, in their “noble and ethical task” of educating youth about the Catholic faith, can help create a more “just” Canadian society by welcoming refugees, social justice activist Mary Jo Leddy told the 15th annual When Faith Meets Pedagogy conference. 

The Oct. 27 to 29 conference, which was sponsored by the Catholic Curriculum Corporation, featured workshops for Catholic school teachers across the province.

In keeping with the conference's theme “Room for all at the table: Gathered, Nourished and Sent Forth,” Leddy spoke on welcoming refugees in Canada.

VATICAN CITY - A holistic education of children and young people must include religious education in accordance with the wishes of the children's parents, Pope Benedict XVI told Brazil's new ambassador to the Vatican.

The teaching of religion in public schools, "far from signifying that the state assumes or imposes a specific religious creed, indicates a recognition of religion as a necessary value for the holistic formation of the person," the Pope said Oct. 31.

Along with every university in Canada, the nation������Ƶapp Catholic colleges are stuffed to the gills with undergraduates. More than 90,000 Ontario students showed up for first-year classes this fall, almost 2,000 more than the double cohort year 2003, when the province������Ƶapp universities were accepting two-years’ worth of high school graduates because Grade 13 had been eliminated.

“When I run a principal������Ƶapp orientation session at the beginning of the year, I can only fit 250 into the room. We have 900 first-year students,” said David Sylvester, principal at King������Ƶapp University College in London, Ont. “We can’t even fit them into a room to talk to them.”

Sylvester looks forward to running a more efficient orientation session in the fall of 2013, when the new $11-million Daryl J. King Student Life Centre will be completed. The new complex, designed to meet stringent environmental standards, will include a theatre, student union offices, informal meeting space, a cafe and games area and a learning commons.

Peterborough������Ƶapp first Catholic liberal arts college is responding to the need for solid Catholic education for youth in the diocese, says Fr. Joseph Devereaux, chancellor of the Peterborough diocese.

“The focus is to provide something for youth that will help them,” said Devereaux.

“(It������Ƶapp about) what can we do for youth intellectually, spiritually, socially. A well-rounded education can help provide that.”