A Message from the SJNRA High School Guidance Department:
South Williamsport Area School District is offering an open invitation to community members and parents to attend an informative presentation on Healthy Youth Development entitled "You Need An Oxygen Mask" on Sept. 22 at 7 pm in the South Williamsport High School Auditorium.
Dan Davis is a nationally recognized consultant in the substance abuse prevention field. He has addressed over 2 million students and adults in Junior/Senior High Schools and Universities. His story will encourage everyone.
The parent program explores what is known about healthy and unhealthy youth development in light of family systems and parenting styles. Dan addresses specifically what the family, the school, and the community must do to help the child evolve into the healthy contributing student.
For more information, please call South Williamsport High School.
An Update from the SJNRA Athletic Director:
1. The Fall Sports season is under way and surprisingly we have had good weather so far. The SJNRA Golf team, with mostly inexperienced players, is doing very well. The Jr. High Softball team is starting to gel together and they are competitive in most of their games. The Girls Tennis team are young and putting a lot of effort into all their matches. The Boys and Girls Soccer teams lost a lot of experienced players this year and are in a rebuilding process and have been competitive in most of their games. Overall the players and coaches are dedicated and they should have a successful and enjoyable season. Neumann’s co-op program with Loyalsock School District for football and wrestling continues this year. Please visit www.loyalsockfootball.com for information about the Loyalsock Football program, as well as information for those that may want to join their "Huddle Club", which is a group that supports the football program.
2. FITNESS FACTORY: Arrangements have been finalized so that we are able to use the FITNESS FACTORY training facility for any of our students and athletes that want to spend the extra time trying to improve their health and physical fitness, not only for their sports teams that they participate with, but for their own general health and physical well-being. The new arrangements make it possible to use their facility for a twelve month period from September 2009 to August 2010 and that includes the use of their facility during the summer months when everybody has a tendency to get lazy and put on a few extra calories. They are open 7 days a week and their hours of operation are: Monday thru Thursday 5:00 AM to 9:30 PM, Friday 5:00 AM to 9:00 PM, Saturday 7:00 AM to 3:00 PM and Sunday 7:00 AM to 2:00 PM. There is no cost for our students and athletes to use their facility as our school is picking up the cost through a donation from Mr. Frank Pellegrino. In order to use the facility, students and athletes must obtain an authorization letter from Mr. Lupacchino in the athletic office. If an individual is 16 years or older, they can workout on their own. If they are under 16, then they must be accompanied by an adult. If the adult is not a member of the Fitness Factory, then the adult can not use the equipment but must be present while the youngster works out. However, if the adult wants to workout and use the equipment, they can pay $5.00 for the day rate or they can sign up for a monthly or yearly membership.
3. UP-TO-DATE SPORTS SCHEDULES: We just recently had our new master sports schedules printed. Once again this year, the printing costs were donated by Mrs. Sally Hilsher of Hilsher Graphics in South Williamsport. However, with all printed schedules, there are numerous changes that occur after the schedules are printed. Therefore in order to obtain a current and up-to-date schedule of any of our sports teams, please go to this website: www.highschoolsports.net and click onto the state and then our school and then you are able to pull up any information you may need. You can also obtain information on any other schools. Do not depend on the Sun-Gazette information to be current.
4. NEUMANN PARENTS ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION (NPAA). The Neumann Parents Athletic Association is constantly looking for additional individuals to be involved and help support all our sports programs. Their next meeting will be on Tuesday, 13 October 2009 at 7:00 PM and will be held in the school Library. Any individuals, with or without children at St. John Neumann, are welcome to attend the meetings. If you have any questions, please contact the NPAA President, Mr. Kevin Way at 494-2115.
5. PARENT SUPPORT REQUIRED FROM ALL SPORTS: As previously mentioned, the parents of the Soccer and Basketball teams were providing the majority of the support in order to raise money through the Neumann Parents Athletic Association (NPAA) by working in the concession stands at the Soccer games and at the Basketball games. Since the NPAA supports ALL OF THE SPORTS TEAMS at Neumann through their donation of funds to purchase uniforms, equipment, etc., it was felt that the parents of the other team sports should also donate their time to work in the concession stand at the Soccer or Basketball games. Therefore, starting this month, the parents of players on the Golf, Tennis, Jr. High & Varsity Softball, Football, Track & Field, Baseball, Boys & Girls Tennis, etc., will be contacted and asked to donate only a couple of hours during the school year to work in the concession stand. Anybody in your family or friends, relatives and students can work and represent your family in the concession stand. If you want to volunteer your time before they contact you, give Mr. Kevin Way a call at 494-2115 or Mr. Tom Forquer at 321-9467.
6. PLAYERS NEEDED: Even though we are into the first weeks of the season, we still need some additional players for the Boys Soccer team and also the Girls Tennis team. Both have the bare minimum number of players and need additional players in case of injuries or players unable to play. If anybody is interested, please sign up with Mr. Lupacchino in the Athletic Office.
7. CHEERLEADING PRACTICE: The cheerleading teams have started practice sessions for the upcoming basketball season. If we have enough youngsters, we will have a Junior High and a Varsity squad. At present, the Jr. High Cheerleading will be practicing in the school gym on Monday and Wednesday from 3:00 to 5:30 PM and this is for grades 6 thru 9 and the Varsity Squad is practicing on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday from 3:00 to 5:30 PM and this for grades 9 thru 12. If you have any questions, please contact the coach, Miss Heather Walker at 321-5810.
8. REPLACE TROPHY CASES: We are still looking for somebody that wants to build or donate funds to replace the current trophy cases that we have on the first floor at the entrance area of the school. We currently have four trophy cases of various sizes and they are currently full of trophies from the sports teams, cheerleading and Odyssey of the Mind awards and, in fact, we have extra trophies/awards with no place to display them. We would like to build longer and higher cases that will be able to hold our current awards and also any future ones. Also it will vastly improve the appearance of the entrance area of the school. If anybody is interested in assisting with this project or would like to donate funds for the trophy cases, please contact Mr. Lupacchino at 323-9953, ext 217.
9. THANK YOU: We again would like to thank Dr. Bill Keenan for conducting the sports physicals on 4 September for the athletes that needed their physicals for the Fall Sports season. We would also like to extend our appreciation to Mr. Ryan Bierly, who graciously took the time to cut the grass at our Soccer field at Metzger Park. The grass had not been cut prior to our home games and he did an excellent job of cutting it short and at the right height for our soccer teams. He also stabilized our concession stand by placing two jacks at the back of the stand so that it does not tilt or lean when the workers are moving around in the stand.
Please come out and support all our Fall Sports teams.
