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, [...]
“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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
BY EMILIE DARBY, MUSIC SUPPORT SPECIALIST It's May. How on earth did that happen so fast? But alas, here we are, and as I pull the calendar month of April from above my desk and replace it with the tasks of May, I find myself marvelling at how quickly this year has sped by, and [...]
After a six hour drive from our home near Toronto to Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, my dad let me out of the car. This was the beginning of a significant new chapter in my life—I was leaving home and going to college! After a few hugs and “go-get-em’s,” I headed off to my [...]
“What are you doing next year?” I have been asked this question many times over the past year. The more you answer, “I’m not sure…” the more difficult it becomes to get asked that question (just ask any grade 12 student; they will share this same feeling). But I understand those kids a little better [...]
BY SARAH BESSEY, ACS PARENT I didn’t realize how much I had internalized the lie that I should be all things to my tinies until I was unable to do it all. I spent a fair bit of tears as a young mother on the fallacy that I had to be the one who provided [...]
BY ANNA REDEKOP, ACS PARENT When our daughter, Sadie was 10 months old, she was not meeting several of her developmental milestones. So we took her for genetic testing. I remember sitting her on the ground in the doctor’s office and giving her a cracker thinking everything would be fine and the doctor was about [...]
