ON THE PATH OF TRUTH AND GRACE
BY: MELISSA REDEKOP, ACS BOARD MEMBER I am flawed, imperfect, and at times, painfully aware of it.
Oct
7, 2019
Sep
23, 2019
LET’S RUN THE NUMBERS
“Are you excited to be principal at ACS next year?” I was asked this question a lot over the summer. I always answered that question without hesitation. YES! Some of you might be wondering, how can he say that? Doesn’t he know what he’s getting himself into? As a recovering math teacher, allow me to run [...]
Sep
16, 2019
NATIONALITY CRISIS!
BY BETHANY BAKKER, GRADE 6 TEACHER My mom told me I wasn’t allowed to date anyone west of the Mississippi River. After all, I grew up in Wisconsin. I went to Dordt College in Iowa, met a guy from Chilliwack, got married, and moved to Canada a few years later. Now that I’ve lived here [...]
Sep
9, 2019
ZAMBIAN SMILES!
That's what Collins, our driver in Zambia, kept telling us when taking our pictures. Not Canadian smiles but Zambian smiles. What’s the difference? According to Collins, Zambian smiles are fuller, broader, a lot of teeth or, as one of my favourite quotes from a book, “ones that reach the eyes.” A Conduit of Hope [...]
Aug
27, 2019
HOW WAS YOUR SUMMER?
I’m an educator, and yes that means (generally speaking) summer is indeed a break from the regular rhythm of the school year…and yes, we educators are blessed to enjoy time off that most other industries don’t have the luxury of. I like to refer to summer holidays as a teachers’ Sabbath. It’s an intentional break [...]
Jun
18, 2019
A BACKPACK FULL OF TWEEN STUFF
BY JUSTIN VERWOERD, EDUCATIONAL ASSISTANT When I started my job at ACS Middle, I thought it was perfect: work starts at 8:00 am, meal breaks at 10:30 am and 12 noon, and the weekly schedule is generally unchanging. I was cruising. The perfect job for me. Well, anyone who works at a school, has children, [...]
Jun
11, 2019
GOING TO ZAMBIA!
“Do you want to go to Zambia?” This was not a message I expected to receive from my wife, Jane, while I was away visiting my mom on the Family Day weekend. We had been tossing around some ideas for summer, but mostly they were local and more budget-wise, as last summer, we took a [...]
Jun
3, 2019
REMEMBER WHEN EMAIL WAS EXCITING?
I remember when getting an email was a novelty. I wrote my first email in college to my roommate sitting in the computer lab next to me. Eventually, after marrying and being transplanted to Abbotsford, I used email as a way to keep in touch with my family living in the prairies. I'd turn on [...]
May
27, 2019
THE MUD PUDDLE
BY CAITLYN CHARLEBOIS, GRADE 12 STUDENT Fourteen years ago, I fell into a puddle during recess. One of my only memories of preschool was from that recess. I remember running from the small playground to the swing set across the field. Except—and maybe what was the worst moment of my life up until that point—I [...]
May
20, 2019
CATCH THIS!
There is something really gratifying in running down a flying disk to score a point for your team. Just ask any of our middle school students who enjoy playing Ultimate during our lunch breaks. Ultimate is a fast paced game that is a hybrid cross of football, Frisbee and handball. One of the really cool [...]
