At St Joseph’s School each student belongs to a household. This is sort of a combination homeroom/fraternity. Boys and girls households are separate. Each household comprises boys or girls from 9 – 12 grade (in the High School) and 6-8 grade in the Middle School. So the kids stay in that household for their whole school career. Good relationships can be forged. Older kids look after younger kids. Younger students look up to the older ones. The household is a place where each student can belong and feel safe.

Each household also has a faculty member dean. The deans take attendance and so forth, but they also have a pastoral role in the school–attending to student problems and helping with spiritual and personal growth.

Each household also has a local charity. My household (14 High School boys) is involved with the Knights of Columbus. We help with their fund raisers, work on poor boxes at Christmas, and each year on 1 May to celebrate St Joseph the Worker we head out into the community to do volunteer work for the day. These pictures show me and my guys doing some serious yard work at the KoC local headquarters.