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Basic Idea of a House System
The house system is an old English university tradition, recently reimagined in the Harry Potter fantasy stories, which is being implemented today in many primary and secondary schools that participate in the classical education movement. In a house system, each student is assigned a group, or “house,” of other students from all grade levels and stays in that house for all his or her years at the school. Furthermore, all siblings are assigned to the same house. The houses then compete against one another in academics, the arts, athletics, service, and spontaneous acts of virtue, acquiring points that accumulate over the course of each academic year and are totaled at the end of the year, and the winning house is recognized. Points are given from regular activities, such as report card honor roll, and also from special “house” competition events, such as the “House Games” twice a year, which consist of athletic and academic tournaments. Through the competition of the house system, students will be encouraged to work together and to individually develop their talents and virtues at a deeper level than they otherwise would, and this will ultimately strengthen and unify the school as a whole.
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Mission of the St. Mary's House System
The mission of the St. Mary’s House System is to form life-long disciples growing in faith, reason, human development, and apostleship, and in all of this, finding their personal identity as sons or daughters of God.
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Goals of the House System
- To strengthen a school culture of striving after virtue
- To develop deeper bonds between students of different grade levels
- To increase opportunities to practice leadership
- To create space for a student to grow in a healthy, heroic, and holy identity
- To foster an appropriate spirit of chivalry
- To draw parents into deeper participation in the school, through involvement in house activities
- To build up the school as a whole, in all strength and fraternity
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Divisions of HousesA. 4 houses, each with a boys’ division and a girls’ division. Each of the four houses has both a male and a female patron saint
B. Each house competes as a single house, combining all points from boys and girls in that house
C. Nevertheless, certain house activities, including some competitions, will be single gender activities, in order to foster the particular virtues of masculinity and femininity separately.
D. Ages of Participation
- Grades 3-8.
- At the beginning of each school year, incoming third grade students and students entering higher grades who are new to the school will be inducted into a house on the day celebrating our school patron, Mary of the Assumption.
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House IdentitiesA. Names and Virtues
- House of ANCHOR - representing FAITH.
Our Christian faith is our primary anchor, or source of security in life.
- House of SCROLL - representing REASON.
The workings of reason were recorded on scrolls starting in ancient times. We apply reason to our faith as well as to all our human experience.- House of LYRIC - representing HUMANITY.
Lyrics are written to express the full range of human experience. The house name, Lyric, is paired with the crest image of a lyre, the ancient musical instrument that a poet typically played while reciting the lyrics of his song or story. Lyrics are an invisible reality which here symbolize the human soul; whereas the lyre is a visible, physical object and here symbolizes the human body. Together, lyric and lyre represent the united life of body and soul which we call humanity.- House of FLAME - representing APOSTLESHIP.
The dynamic activity and the contagious energy of Christian Apostleship is symbolized by the “fire of the Holy Spirit” described in the Acts of the Apostles.
B. Patron Saints
Principle of Selection:
Whereas the school as a whole emphasizes the study of history -- going far into the past, from ancient times, through the middle ages, and into modernity -- and the other academic disciplines are integrated therewith, the house system patrons, on the other hand, are chosen from recent times, i.e. from the 20th century, for the purpose of providing an especially fresh sense and relatable model of Christian discipleship for our young people.- House of Anchor, Virtue of Faith
St. Jose Sanchez del Rio: a Mexican boy-soldier in the rebel army during the Cristero War who was captured, tortured, and killed by the ruling atheistic army for continuing to proclaim his faith in Christ.
St. Therese of Lisieux: a French Carmelite nun who had first entered the religious life at the unusually young age of fifteen after requesting special permission from the pope. After dying from sickness at age 24, her autobiography soon became popular and led to her being given the extremely rare title of “Doctor of the Church,” for its descriptions of the life of holiness.- House of Scroll, Virtue of Reason
St. Pope John Paul the Great: a polish man who studied for the priesthood illegally and in secret during the Nazi occupapation, and eventually became a bishop who helped bring an end to the Soviet Union. A lifelong scholar, his writings as pope shed great light on the relation between faith and reason and on the Theology of the Body.
St. Edith Stein: a Jewish girl who converted to Catholic Christianity through her study of philosophy. After becoming a Carmelite nun, she was sent to a Nazi concentation camp and eventually executed.- House of Lyric, Virtue of Humanity
St. Pier Giorgio Frassati: a lover of the arts and outdoor recreation who spent much of his spare time serving the poor in the streets of Turin, Italy, in addition to taking leadership in spiritual and political activist groups In his 20’s, he died of disease probably contracted from the poor he served.
St. Gianna Molla: an Italian doctor, wife, and mother who showed exceptional devotion to her husband, children, and God in the midst of her professional career. She stands out most for sacrificing her life to save her child in the womb, by refusing to have her cancerous uterus removed until the child was delivered, which, as had been expected, led to Gianna’s death shortly thereafter.- House of Flame, Virtue of Apostleship
St. Maximillian Kolbe: a Polish Franciscan friar who was devoted to a life of purity and evangelization. After receiving two PhDs, in Philosophy and Theology, he founded several monasteries and a popular periodical. Eventually, however, he was captured by the Nazis and imprisoned in Auschwitz, where he continued a life of holiness until his death in a starvation bunker -- a sentence planned for another prisoner until Kolbe volunteered himself in that prisoner’s place.
St. Frances Xavier Cabrini: a Itlalian girl who was turned down by the religious order she applied to, due to her lifelong fragile state of health, but who went on to co-found a religious order and become a foreign missionary. Moving to the United States, she founded dozens of schools, hospitals, and orphanages which primarily served poor Italian immigrants.
C. House Mottos
Each house picks a motto for the year, from a quotation by one of its patron saints. This motto will then be printed on such things as the house t-shirt of that year.
D. House Colors
- House of Anchor:
DARK PURPLE - For the solemnity of Faith- House of Scroll:
TEAL - For the sky, pure and lofty, filled with light, like power of Reason- House of Lyric:
HUNTER GREEN - For the natural life and organic growth we need in our Humanity- House of Flame:
RED - For the fire of the Holy Spirit and of Apostleship
E. House Crests
- House of Anchor
- House of Scroll
- House of Lyric
- House of Flame
F. Items Displaying Crest and Color- Locker Plaques
- Banner
- T-Shirts - to be worn for school on days of monthly house meetings