Spirit Week Comes Alive

Posted on February 2, 2011 by admin

Welcome to the dead of winter. As Canadians we are used to the demands of this season – short days, storms, biting cold weather. As a reputed Canadian writer once expressed, we Canadians are the “People of the shield;” we are defined by our harsh natural environment and the demands it places on us day-to-day. In short, we live in a difficult climate, but we know how to adapt, and part of adapting is appreciating the best of winter.

Welcome also to Spirit Week. For years we have held a Spirit Week in the middle of winter so we can come together and have some fun despite the cold weather and short days. Interestingly, this short academic term is actually particularly busy outside of the classroom in terms of co-curricular activities. In fact, winter is actually the busiest athletic tournament season of the year, with many evening and weekend competitions for both boys and girls. Last weekend I attended several basketball and hockey games at LCC and some at local high schools. For all the teams it was a busy and successful weekend. Congratulations to players and coaches, and best of luck as teams wrap up their seasons in coming days.

In addition to athletics, student debaters have had a great success at local and university tournaments and the annual Montreal Robotics competition is coming up. There have been several creative One-Act Plays in grade 9, and the Middle School play, School Daze is coming up soon. We are also preparing to host 90 delegates from February 13-18 for the 2011 Young Round Square Conferences for schools from North and South America. All of these are wonderful vehicles for learning and engagement.

So here we are in the middle of Sprit Week, a special chance to have some fun, to promote broad student involvement and hone school pride. But it seems to me that LCC spirit and school pride are not only on show during this single week – a strong school spirit is alive and well throughout the year. Impressive! Go LCC go! Enjoy a great Spirit Week! —Chris Shannon, Headmaster

The Tragic Loss of Jason Peagram ’05

Posted on January 18, 2011 by admin

Monday in the USA was, Martin Luther King Day, a national holiday. It was a day for reflection and an opportunity to celebrate the great black Civil rights leader who did so much on behalf of all African Americans. In fact, Reverend Martin Luther King Junior dedicated his life to building bridges between peoples of all different backgrounds in the great American melting pot. So essentially, the national holiday was a day to celebrate diversity, racial equity, peace and compassion. It was well timed on the heels of the traumatic shooting only days ago in Tucson Arizona that killed or injured more than a dozen people, including a member of the House of Representatives who has miraculously survived a bullet to the brain.

So as America reflected and searched for avenues toward a more peaceful society, here at LCC we are also reminded of the callous impact of violence. Sadly, Jason Peagram, 22-years old and an LCC graduate from the Class of 2005, was killed late last week in a shooting here in our fair city – Montreal’s first homicide for 2011.

Monday, as America celebrated Doctor King’s important message of peace, I joined colleagues from LCC and attended Jason Peagram’s funeral. It is always tragic and somewhat unnatural to watch a mother bury her son. The fact that he was a victim of such a violent act only made it more difficult.

As the presiding priest shared with the congregation, this untimely and violent death of a 22 year-old with his future before him, reminds us that there is indeed evil in the world. That the grace and sanctity of life was taken from Jason in the street in a violent manner was shocking and brutal. We were advised to be cautious of violence that is creeping onto Canadian streets and into our households. Indeed, we should all be alarmed. We were also asked to consider what we have done for others recently. You see, Jason was a regular volunteer. A love of service was an attribute he picked up while at LCC–most recently as a volunteer with kids involved in basketball programs at the Trevor Williams Kids Foundation. The priest at the funeral also asserted that we should all be wary of selfishness, narcissism, and a tendency for all of us to be too self-absorbed. So how can we counter reckless, illogical violence? It is only through love, sharing and community outreach that we will defeat brash violence. Together we have to smother it. It begins in our daily lives at school and in our homes.

A young LCC brother was buried on Monday. He was a victim of a willful act of violence and we should all feel a sort of inner personal outrage. However, we cannot allow violence to triumph. Stop and reflect how you can respond through a personal gesture or act of compassion or empathy. However small or large, let’s each dedicate an individual private act of kindness to the memory of Jason Peagram, Class of ’05.

Jason’s Irish roots were evident at his funeral and the final words of the following traditional Irish prayer provided a fitting farewell.

Jason: “May the road rise to meet you. May the wind be always at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face. May the rains fall soft upon your fields and until we meet again, May the Lord hold you in the palm of His hand.”
—Chris Shannon, Headmaster

Holiday Observations

Posted on January 13, 2011 by admin

Happy New Year and welcome to the second decade of the 21st Century. The lengthy and restful holiday period has provided inspiration for this entry and, as we prepare for the year ahead, I have three observations to share.

First, the Christmas and Hanukah season is a period of great celebration including the luxury of quality time with family and friends. But it’s also a season of excess: too much food, drink, sweets, and late nights. By the time we awake on January 1st, most of us are begging for a couple of quiet days and nights – a chance for our feet to come down to earth and really relax after exams, weeks of preparations and seasonal parties.

This was not the case for 43 year-old Donna Simpson from New Jersey who currently weighs about 600 lbs. – and has a goal of becoming the world’s heftiest woman, hoping to eventually reach 1,000 lbs! She has a website where people pay to watch her eat, consuming over 12,000 calories per day. She’s a poster girl for North American excess! All by herself, here’s what Mrs. Simpson ate on Christmas Day – an unbelievable 30,000 calorie gluttonous holiday feast:

• two 25 lb turkeys
• two maple-glazed hams
• 15 lbs. potatoes
• 5 loves bread
• 5 lbs turkey stuffing
• 4 pints gravy
• 4 pints cranberry sauce
• 20 lbs. vegetables

Unbelievable – one person. Mrs. Simpson definitely wins the gold star for excess in this age of excess.

A second observation over the holiday relates to all the end-of- year lists that are so popular during the week between Christmas and January 1st. You know what I mean: the year’s top songs, news events and so forth. Did you know that at the end of the year researchers told us that Canadians spend more time online than people in any other nation? We’re particularly fond of YouTube. According to a new international study, the average Canadian spends 42 hours online every month, including the viewing of 147 short videos/month. This is 50% more than any other country. So, as a nation we’re probably pleased that Time Magazine’s Person of the Year for 2010 was Mark Zuckerberg, the 20-something multi-billionaire creator of Facebook – an idea/tool that seems to have had more impact on Canadians than any other nationality in the world.

My third and final observation came on a short 5-day visit to Cuba. Cuba remains a communist country with very different standards for foreign tourists and locals. Beyond the hotels, beaches and comfort reserved for foreign visitors is the dilapidated Cuban infrastructure and a broken economy. I found out that virtually all basic foodstuffs are rationed and, for the past several weeks, milk has not been available to Cubans. However, as a foreigner I could by milk at a very inflated price – 25 times what Cubans pay. So the day that I visited Old Havana and hoped to buy a piece of Cuban art work, things turned out differently. While walking in the old city, I met a young father and several mothers who were desperate to find milk for their babies. I offered to buy some milk, but that still required two hours of walking and searching in Old Havana, as there was no milk to be found in the first 10 stores we visited. Finally we found the milk and thankfully, five families were happy. I didn’t find the Cuban painting I hoped to buy, but I did manage to do something in keeping with the spirit of giving that underpins the season, and I do feel better for it.

Excess, Canadians on the Internet, and alleviating some of the suffering of neighbours in one of the world’s last communist states. I learned a lot while on my break. I hope you did too.–Christopher Shannon, Headmaster

December: A Time to Focus on Peace

Posted on December 16, 2010 by admin

It’s important to recognize key dates in history as major events in the past frame and define who we are as a people today. A difficult yet important event and anniversary in our December calendar and in our collective Canadian memory was December 6th – the Montreal Massacre at École Polytechnique, the engineering school at the University of Montreal. This year marked the 21st anniversary of the tragic event.

A deranged, lone gunman did the shooting. Fourteen women, mostly young engineering students, died in this attack. It shocked our nation and the world, but it actually led to greater national awareness and consciousness about violence against women and the need to eliminate gender-based violence across Canada. To mark it, December 6th is now the national Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence against women, with the national “White Ribbon Campaign” to combat violence against women in homes, schools and workplaces.

Another notable outcome of the shooting was the achievement of Mrs. Suzanne Edwards, a Montrealer and mother of Anne-Marie Edwards, one of the engineering students killed in the attack. Mrs. Edwards’ relentless effort in her daughter’s memory was instrumental in leading toward the creation of a National Gun Registry and application of stricter rules for the ownership of guns (especially automatic weapons) by Canadian citizens.

The Montreal Massacre at the École Polytheqnique will be forever etched in our national memory – part of our collective experience as Canadians. Let’s all learn from it.
The White Ribbon Campaign is a national initiative underscoring peaceful resolution to problems and the reduction of gender-based conflict. In our 16th year as a coed school, I want to openly affirm and support LCC’s commitment to gender equality and the reduction of violence against women.

As we enter the holiday season, remember this is indeed the season of peace, friendship and the warmth of family gatherings. May your holiday be restful. During some of your quiet time, please reflect on how you are, and can be, a peace-maker. Happy holidays and best wishes for 2011. —Chris Shannon, Headmaster

Teeming with Potential

Posted on November 25, 2010 by admin

I had a special day last Tuesday. At the outset of the morning, sixteen bright-eyed members of Kindergarten visited me in my office. At this early stage in their development, every trip beyond the confines of “la Maison Maternelle” is a learning experience and journey of discovery. They asked what I actually do at LCC, and after some discussion, it still remained a mystery. The only “doers” in their eyes are their gifted teachers who teach, encourage, guide and support them everyday in their classroom. The children were satisfied with more pedestrian questions: what is my favorite shape (round) and colour (blue)? Why are all the “big kids” allowed to walk around without their teachers? Is the shovel in my office that was used to turn the sod on our new arena construction project in 2007 made out of real gold? What a fabulous group of children, teeming with potential and yearning to learn at all times.

Later that morning we had a visit from Walter Dean Myers, author of Monster, this year’s LCC Reads selection—our community summer reading/literacy initiative. Started six years ago by English Department Head Brian Moore and Head Librarian Maria Varvarikos, the program has been widely embraced by students and staff. Mr. Myers is the fifth author from the LCC Reads program to have followed our collective summer reading experience with a visit to 4090 Royal to address our Middle and Senior School student body. Mr. Myers was wonderful in explaining how he plies his craft: up every morning at 5 am for three to four hours of writing, always producing five pages of his novel—never six or four, always five pages. It is this kind of commitment and measured certainty that has allowed him to publish more than one hundred novels, mostly aimed at adolescent readers.

For many, the description of his early life was most interesting. Mr. Myers lost his mother at an early age and was placed in foster care. He suffered from a speech impediment that made him the brunt of many jokes among peers. Frustrated, he spent much of his youth in Harlem fighting, but not just with other boys, also girls, his teachers, and on one occasion, the mailman. Along the way he found comfort in books and became an avid reader. He claimed it was that skill that allowed him to mature and emerge. He slowly gained confidence in his own capacity to share stories with others as a writer. Mr. Myers openly encouraged all of our students to read as much as possible. Like our Kindergarten students, even our high school students need to remember that they too are teeming with potential. I am pleased that an accomplished writer was able to remind them that continuing to develop reading skills is essential to their success—and success they will experience because of LCC Reads! —Chris Shannon, Headmaster