Movember Madness @ LCC

Posted on November 7, 2012 by admin

LCC’s Mark Capombassis ’88 is our guest blogger. He shares how he, and subsequently LCC, got involved with Movember.

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I got involved with Movember because it raises money for men’s cancer. My father, Panos Capombassis, died of cancer: it was in his memory that I first chose to get involved. I created my first Movember team in 2011, and we raised over $120,000 with a mere six-member team. We were the #1 team worldwide (of 10 people or less) for funds raised…and we had fun doing it.

After the success of the 2011 campaign I wanted to get more involved with Movember, so I joined the Montreal Board of Directors in 2012. My goal in 2012 is to help create more teams and inspire more people to participate in this important initiative.

I was aware that Movember does a great job getting university students involved, but I had never heard of the organization doing anything specifically with high schools. I know that when I was in high school, my friends and I would have definitely grown moustaches if we had been given the permission to do so! We would have done it for the fun of it as well for the cause. With that in mind, I thought “let’s get my old high school involved.”

I had initially approached LCC to participate in 2011, but there was not enough time to assemble a team, so Kirk LLano (Director of Philanthropy and Alumni Relations) and I decided to talk about the possibility again mid-2012. Kirk gave me the go ahead to come into the school and talk to the grade 11 boys after lunch one day. With Kirk’s support and enthusiasm, he has created a movement within the school to get the kids signed up. To date LCC Stash is up to 48 people on the team and that is far more than I ever could have hoped for in our first year.

In addition to LCC’s involvement I have created a Canadian High School Network where another 20 high schools from across Canada have joined. Together we will show the capacity this demographic has in raising awareness and funds for a great cause.

My Movember goals for 2012 have been as follows:

Continue my personal efforts to raise awareness in honour of my father
Create a Movember LCC team
Create a Movember Canadian High School Network
Use the success of our Canadian High School Network to encourage high schools worldwide to get involved in Movember

I’m well on my way. — Mark Capombassis ’88

Une question d’éthique et de valeurs

Posted on October 31, 2012 by admin

Je suis directrice du programme primaire (de la maternelle à la 6^e année) du Lower Canada College et mère de trois enfants âgés de 10, 8 et 3 ans. À titre de professionnelle et de mère, je suis toujours intéressée de savoir où en sont les enseignants dans leur réflexion professionnelle. Lors d’une récente réunion du personnel du programme primaire, j’ai posé la question suivante à mon équipe d’enseignants : « S’il ne vous restait plus qu’une journée à enseigner, quel sujet souhaiteriez-vous aborder avec vos élèves? » Incroyablement, chacun d’entre eux a répondu à la question par des mots comme « respect », « compassion », « tolérance » et « intégrité ». C’était un réel plaisir à entendre!

Même si on s’attend de nos enseignants qu’ils développent continuellement les divers cours prescrits par le ministère de l’Éducation et qu’ils remplissent des bulletins de notes principalement axés sur la maîtrise des connaissances à l’égard de sujets précis, les écoles jouent également un rôle important dans l’enseignement des aptitudes sociales. En fait, ce rôle constitue même une obligation morale.

Les règles et attentes sociales à l’égard du comportement doivent faire partie du « programme indirect » de toutes les écoles et être enseignées au même titre que d’autres compétences. À moins que nous n’inculquions ces valeurs aux élèves – nos enfants – tout comme nous leur enseignons les mathématiques et la grammaire, nous ne pouvons pas nous attendre à ce que nos jeunes sachent se comporter dans les situations de la vie quotidienne, ni même qu’ils y soient préparés. En fait, comment pourrions-nous être déçus de les voir mal se comporter si au départ on ne leur a pas montré à agir autrement?

Un programme bien défini d’éducation lié au caractère contribue à créer un climat scolaire positif. Nos élèves sont nos leaders de demain et nous ne pouvons qu’espérer qu’au moment de leur remise de diplômes, ils fassent preuve non seulement de capacité intellectuelle, mais aussi de responsabilité sociale.

En mettant l’accent sur l’éducation à la fois de l’esprit et du cœur, nous veillons à ce que nos enfants soient prêts à faire face aux défis que l’avenir leur réserve avec confiance aussi bien qu’avec compassion.

Évidemment, en matière d’éducation du caractère, le soutien de la famille est essentiel, mais je me réserve le sujet du partenariat parent-école pour un futur blogue!

Yasmine Ghandour
Directrice du programme primaire du Lower Canada College et mère de trois enfants

Character Matters

Posted on October 31, 2012 by admin

I’m the director of Lower Canada College’s Junior School program (K-6) and also the parent of three children, ages 10, 8 and 3. As a professional and a mother, I’m always curious about where teachers are at in their professional thinking. At a recent Junior School staff meeting, I asked my team of teachers: “If you had only one day left to teach, what would you want to teach your students?” Interestingly, every single one of them answered the question using words like “respect,” “compassion,” “tolerance” and “integrity.” Music to my ears!

Even though our teachers are continually asked to work on developing the various courses prescribed by the Ministry of Education, and filling out report cards that focus predominantly on subject-specific mastery of skills, schools have an important role to play in teaching social skills. In fact, you might even consider it a moral obligation.

Social rules and expectations of behaviour need to become part of every school’s “hidden curriculum” and taught like any other set of skills. Unless we teach these to students—our children—as we teach them math and grammar, we simply can’t expect our young ones to know how to behave in, let alone be prepared for, real-life situations. More specifically, we cannot be disappointed in them for having behaved wrongly if they were not taught otherwise.

A well-defined character education program helps to create a positive school environment. Our students are our future leaders and our hope is that they graduate not only intellectually capable, but socially responsible too.

By putting an emphasis on educating the heart as well as the mind, we ensure that our children will be ready to meet the challenges of the future not only with confidence but also with compassion.

Of course, the support of the family in character education is also key, but I’ll leave the parent-school partnership as a topic for a future blog!

Yasmine Ghandour
Junior School Director at Lower Canada College and mother of three

When It’s OK to Drop the Ball

Posted on October 29, 2012 by admin

As a teenager in the 1970s, I remember making a few embarrassing mistakes in high school that led to consequences I didn’t like. My parents never interfered with school discipline. They believed I had “earned” whatever punished came my way. I assure you, I learned from the queasy feeling that formed in my stomach every time I let people down who I respected. In-school punishments also had their intended impact. Like all young people, I eventually learned to modify my behaviour to avoid unwanted punishments and the unsettling feelings.

We recently hosted Dr. Alex Russell at LCC. In his address to parents he reminded us that students need to feel the pain of failure. However, in his practice he sees many parents trying too hard to diminish negative consequences for their children – and soften the blow when their children intersect painfully with the real world. Dr. Russell sent a clear message: not a good idea.

As a psychologist, he has written a book called “Drop the Worry Ball: Parenting in the Age of Entitlement.” He reminds parents that making mistakes and “facing the music” is an essential part of growing up. Mistakes are an unavoidable and inevitable part of life; stressful and difficult experiences essentially help children to learn how to cope with the rough edges of the world.

In fact, Dr. Russell told parents that the only failure in life that should be avoided is what he calls “catastrophic failure.” All other screw-ups help young people learn from their experiences – so hopefully they will perform better the next time. This is what happens in schools every day. It’s a key part of learning and maturing.

In the words of Dr. Russell, parents need to “drop the worry ball” and children and teenagers need to actually pick up the worry ball – not to become overly-stressed, but to learn how to face consequences of their actions, to navigate the world through progressive independence and the satisfaction that comes from genuine achievement.

So, let’s all try and do our best and see where the worry ball lands. The kids will be all right. –Christopher Shannon, Headmaster

Round Square: A Rich Mosaic of Culture

Posted on October 17, 2012 by admin

It is rare to have the opportunity to sit in a room alongside people from five different continents, and to, over the course of an hour, have eight conversations with people from eight different countries. The conference, hosted at Herlufsholm Skole in Denmark, acted as a binding force between people from every corner of the globe: people traveled from near (England and Germany) and far (Armenia, Kenya, India, Australia, South Africa, and Canada). A beautiful blend of accents and languages could be heard echoing through the school’s halls at any given moment. We were fortunate enough to have delegates from all Round Square regions at the conference, so we knew that we had a culturally enriching experience in store for us. Personally, my participation in the conference was so incredibly different from anything that I had ever experienced. Although I have been fortunate enough to travel quite a bit in my lifetime, I had never had the opportunity to interact with so many people of my age from so many diverse places at once. I was fascinated by the rich cultures and ideas that each group of delegates brought to the conference. I loved hearing stories about their day-to-day lives. It was evident that although we all came from such different backgrounds and experiences, we were all the same in so many ways.

Several days into the conference, each group had the opportunity to display their culture in a much-anticipated cultural evening, which would prove to be a highlight of everybody’s trip. The event showcased diverse cultural features from each country, including a traditional Danish dance, a British poem recitation, an Indian yoga demonstration, a lesson on Australian slang, and many more. We were taken on a journey across the globe in just two hours. We, along with the students from Toronto, presented a reenactment of Canadian history. This particular moment in the conference truly captured one of Round Square’s central “IDEALS:” internationalism. The national pride that each group displayed, as well as international pride and appreciation for the enthusiasm of our fellow delegates, was palpable. The most incredible aspect of the evening was the lasting impression that it seemed to have on all of the participants; it sparked curiosity and desire to learn more about each culture that we were exposed to. The evening seemed to accomplish the fundamental objective of the conference: to “encounter, engage, and enjoy” the rich mosaic of culture that we were fortunate enough to immerse ourselves in for a week. — Allie Mayers ’13