PRESIDENT’S PERSPECTIVE

Dear Ursuline Community,

Beginning last year, my first year as Academy president, we faced a year marked by great success and profound challenges for Ursuline Academy and our community, but we faced them together. We all know the challenges posed by Hurricane Ida striking our area in August, causing widespread damage and pain. Beginning school again three weeks later was an additional challenge for everyone, especially our displaced families. However, I was grateful for the opportunity to see the Ursuline community spirit in action. While members of our community were dealing with loss, our greater Ursuline community came together to provide support in numerous ways and, in the true Ursuline spirit of Serviam, helped share the burdens some were experiencing. While we still faced COVID challenges last year, our students and staff persevered to bring back old traditions and create some new ones. In the spring, when we could unmask and see everyone’s beautiful smiles every day, we felt such shared joy in our Ursuline family.

The successes of the school year were many. In high school, they came in the form of sports championships, academic awards, scholarships, and more. Everyday moments and events in elementary grades and special events like the St. Joseph Altar, Living Rosary, and 7th Grade promotion brought joy to our days. Opening the Lily House in August and blessing the sacred space gifted to us by the Sisters, who gave their former home to house the youngest of our community, brought much additional joy and gratitude.

This school year saw a total return to our usual way of being and interacting as a community, which brings many blessings to us all. We celebrated Rally, welcomed alumnae to Homecoming and La Fête, and celebrated our grandparents. I feel honored to be part of these young ladies’ (and some young early childhood boys'!) journeys in academics, faith, and growth as compassionate leaders.

It has been a true privilege to be at Ursuline and lead through the joys and the challenges. We, as a staff, humbly accept our lay leadership roles as we endeavor to ensure the charism of our dear Ursuline Sisters remains foundational to our Academy. As a Catholic school educator and leader, I continue to feel humbly blessed and called to lead Ursuline through the guiding charism of Serviam – I will serve.

As you read through Ursu.Lines, I hope you will share our pride in the joyful moments of this past year. We also continue to look to our future as we work to ensure our academic foundations are both rigorous and innovative, foster Catholic faith formation, and ensure that our diversity, inclusion, and belonging work progresses. All community members should feel the belonging that our foundress St. Angela sought to form in her company. St. Angela wrote in her last counsel to her company that they should “… live in harmony, united together, all of one heart and one will.” The words of her final counsel are our guiding theme for this school year.

Thank you all for your work to ensure Ursuline’s future as we continue the tradition of 296 years of Ursuline education in New Orleans!

Serviam

Dr. Karen G. Jakuback Academy President

On Wednesday, December 15, 2021 the Academy held a dedication for Lily House, a new space that provides a small and welcoming environment for boys and girls from 6 weeks through age 1. A prayer service and blessing by Most Reverend Gregory M. Aymond, Archbishop of New Orleans, preceded the dedication. Honored guests included Dr. RaeNell Houston, Superintendent of Catholic Schools for the Archdiocese of New Orleans; Ursuline Sisters; Ursuline Academy Board of Trustees members Dr. Kristin Van Hook Moore ’92, Jessica Kennedy Becker ’89, David

Huete, and Justin Fleetwood. Named in honor of Ursuline foundress St. Angela Merici, the Lily House is located in the former Nashville Convent and offers an intimate, safe space for our youngest students to develop meaningful relationships with their peers and teachers during their most formative years. The beautiful renovation has been made possible through the generosity of Wayne and Jackie Leonard in hopes of nurturing children with love, strength, and courage.

Congratulations to the 2022 Division II

LHSAA Golf State Champions, Sweden Ledet '22 and Ariana Blagrove '23. Our fierce competitors turned in two of the top individual scores for the Division II victory. The Lions turned in a final round 11-over par score of 155 thanks to the 76 of Sweden Ledet and the 79 of Ariana Blagrove on the Wetlands Golf Club Course (5,760-yard, par-72) in Lafayette. This created a 14-stroke margin in the final round and a 317 total, which was 27 strokes ahead of runnerup Ouachita Christian. We are so proud of these Lions! Thank you, Coach Kyle, for leading Ari and Sweden through this well-deserved victory.