Click here to see this year's calender! (.pdf)

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Sports

The goal of the SJV athletic program is to encourage and develop self esteem, a cooperative spirit, good sportmanship, a sense of fair play, and strong character and leadership ability in our students. Athletics also provides an opportunity to teach the fundamentals of games and teamwork, and to encourage physical development.

The sports offered at SJV include:

• Volleyball (CAA - Catholic Athletic Association).
  Fourth, fifth and sixth grade girls.
  

• Soccer (CAA).
  Fourth, fifth and sixth grade boys.
  

• Basketball (CAA).
  Fifth and sixth grade girls and boys.
  

• Baseball (CAA).
  Fifth and sixth grade boys.
  

• Swimming (CAA).
  K through sixth grade girls and boys.
  

• Softball (South St. Paul).
  Fifth and sixth grade girls and boys (Midget League).
  Third and fourth grade girls and boys (Peanut League).
  

• T-Ball (SJV).
  Kindergarten, first and second grade girls and boys.
  
  

Music

• Band:
  Band instruction is offered to students in grades 4-6. Instrument lessons are scheduled during the school day with the SJV band instructor. The school band performs at school events (e.g. Christmas concert). Instruments can be purchased or rented through local music stores.
  

• Piano Lessons:
  Piano lessons are offered to students in all grade levels. Piano lessons can be scheduled both during the school day, and after school.
  
  

Scouts

Scouting groups for both girls and boys in grades 1-6 are available at SJV. Scouting activities are organized and operated by volunteer scout leaders from the SJV community. Information on scouting activities are provided to students and parents at the beginning of the school year.

Public Achievement (Grades 4 - 6)

Public Achievement (PA) is a youth and politics initiative of Project Public Life at the University of Minnesota's Hubert Humphrey Institute. The purpose of P.A. is to empower youth to redefine politics as the everyday public work of citizens. P.A is part of St. John Vianney's commitment to the formation of Gospel values and the development of citizens who can effectively and constructively contribute in our ever changing democratic society.

P.A. members participate in Issue Groups which, under the guidance of an adult coach, develop and enact action plans to create positive changes and results in their issue area. Groups meet weekly to work on projects, conduct background research and learn together from their experiences.SJV currently has the following active P.A. Groups:

• Help Everyone to Leave Poverty
  

The principle of caring for the poor was a big concern for the PA homeless group. Before any work could be done they had a lot of questions, who are the poor? and where do they live? and why are they poor? and what does poverty mean? The team's coaches helped the students with a lot of research trying to answer these questions. Finally after feeling comfortable with their new knowledge, they thought they would help educate others about what they found out by designing a brochure which included a list of resources. At one of the Masses at St John Vianney Church they announced their project and distributed the brochures to the parishioners.

• Caring for All God's Creation
  

Caring for God's Creation was the mission of three of our PA groups: The Ravine team, the Mississippi River team and the Energy Conservation team.

The Ravine group has been an ongoing PA issue at St John Vianney School. The students are concerned with all the litter and sometimes unusual trash (they found an old dryer) they see in the ravine. This ravine butts up to the church's property and can be seen by the students at recess. The students cleaned out the ravine and continued the process of last year's PA group in getting permission from the city to put up No Dumping Allowed signs. This group acquired the funds to purchase two signs and contacted the city engineer.

The Mississippi Clean up Crew started out with concerns about the pollution caused by flooding in Louisiana and Mississippi. Their research took them to the Mississippi River flowing right here through South St. Paul. An idea to clean up the river led them to networking with other groups with the same goal and students learned the concept of public work. Not only will they be helping with other citizens of South St. Paul to clean-up on Earth Day, April 22, but they will be soliciting your help in this stewardship of the earth.

The Coaches of the Energy Conservation Group have been exemplifying the core concept of citizenship by getting involved to help the community to be a better place. They began their issue with concerns about the high price of gasoline. Their research led them to focus on how much energy we consume. Many hours were spent educating themselves on this timely issue and they worked together to write an informative letter they sent to numerous newspapers in the Twin Cities area.

• Kids Against Child Labor
  

The principles of the economic justice and dignity of all people guided our young people in the Kids Against Child Labor group. This issue group has been ongoing since 2001, when SJV school had a team from the the Resource Center of the Americas deliver a workshop promoting their sweatshop-free campaign. Caring for others, especially children in our global community is an issue that concerns all of us. Students in the group researched companies and produced a video using a commercial format that gives facts about common things made using child labor. In addition to doing the research, the students wrote, filmed and acted for the video. This group also had the pleasure of hosting a guest from Laos. She is working to end human trafficking in her country and spoke to the children about her work to end child labor.

• Dignity of All People
  

St. John Vianney's Support the Troops group hosted a guest speaker from the Marines. They had lots of questions for him about how they could support the troops and what it was like to be a Marine and how he decided to join. The students wrote letters to the troops and they gave them to him to distribute through an organization at the University of Minnesota where he is working with returning soldiers.

• Traffic Safety
  

The public work of our Traffic Safety group was seen throughout South St. Paul on cable TV at a City Council meeting. Student citizens in this group were concerned with an unsafe intersection near school and one of the team member's home. They met with the city engineer and came up with a plan. Coaches and students met on a Saturday afternoon to go house to house in the neighborhood asking for a petition to be signed to get a caution sign put up. After the petition was signed, students wrote letters to the neighbors and informed them of the city council meeting, when the city council would be voting on the sign. Our Traffic Safety group attended the meeting, introduced themselves and explained their proposal. The South St. Paul city engineer recommended the sign be approved and it was unanimously passed by the South St Paul City Council.