The SPRING 2012 LeaderNEWS FOR THE TRINITY HIGH SCHOOL FAMILY WWW.TRINITYROCKS.COM A LETTER TO THE TRINITY COMMUNITY My husband, Steve, was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in January 2005. Two months later, he died. My son, Stevie, was a junior at the time. You can imagine the emotional roller coaster it was for my family and me, let alone trying to figure out how Stevie would finish at Trinity. On top of that, I had a younger son, Jake, who was only in fifth grade at the time. All my brothers are Trinity alumni, and it was always a dream of my husband and I that our boys would become part of that special family. Suddenly, all that wasn’t so certain. However, thanks to the generous support of donors to the Trinity Annual Fund, we were able to get financial aid to get Stevie through his senior year as well as Jake, who will graduate in May and become a proud Trinity alumnus, too. Accessibility to a Trinity education is a big concern. Some families have only a single parent. Some are working multiple jobs - all in an effort to ensure their sons can become part of the Trinity Family. You just never know when the unexpected will happen and you find yourself in a situation like mine. Without the support of donors to the Trinity Annual Fund, there’s no way my boys could become Trinity alumni. My family is just one example of so many who benefit from this financial assistance. I humbly ask you to please consider making a gift to the Trinity Annual Fund, at whatever level makes the most sense for you and your family. Every gift, no matter the amount, truly does make a difference. I have two young men who are proof of it. With gratitude, Mary Kaye Marshall To make a gift, please Mother of Stevie ’05 and Jake ’12 complete and return the enclosed envelope or go online to www.trinityrocks. com and click on the Donate Now button. PRESIDENT’S NOTEBOOK President’s Notebook BY DR. ROBERT (ROB) J. MULLEN ’77, PRESIDENT ACCREDITATION NEWS • Trinity’s board and committee structures foster I am so proud of the site-visit report presented to engagement and involvement by a wide variety Trinity by the visiting team of education professionals of constituents. Employees, alumni, students and at the conclusion of our recent accreditation cycle. As a parents all participate in decision-making roles fan of the school, you should be proud, too. through active participation in these roles. For the past two decades, we have been accredited • The vision and mission of Trinity High School are by the largest such accrediting association. While we vibrant and apparent through the building and have long been accredited by the Commonwealth within its community. Every stakeholder group of Kentucky (that is why we are allowed to issue spoke of the high quality education steeped in diplomas), seeking membership in what was formerly Catholic Christian tradition that is accessible to all. known as the Southern Association of Colleges and • The school maintains a safe, secure, clean 1 Schools, now known as AdvancED, provided us a new environment for students, employees and visitors. set of benchmarks to follow. This decision called for us Resources are allocated to support the teaching and to be better. And that we have done. learning processes. AdvancED’s goals of the accreditation process • Trinity High School is are clear: committed to continuous • Build capacity of the school to increase improvement. The school and sustain student learning develops and implements • Stimulate and support improvement and strategic plans and school- effectiveness throughout the school improvement plans that • Ensure all people, processes and departments design goals based on data in the school work in concert and marketing reviews. • Strengthen efforts to meet accountability requirements Trust that we won’t rest on our • Encourage growth beyond compliance laurels. There are ways for us to to achieve excellence get better. • Promote continuous not episodic improvement FOOTBALL SEASON The site visit was the culmination of an 18-month Kept within the proper bounds process that was led by our principal, Dan Zoeller of time, place and emphasis, I H’07. Many of you participated in online surveys or believe strongly that the football interviews during this study. Your input and ideas season is indeed worthwhile. The were invaluable in assessing our state of affairs. An noise is ephemeral and does die internal team of teachers and administrators assembled away. The display, the spectacle, documents and materials that could verify to the site the excitement linger only in team what we were saying about Trinity. memory. But the spirit, the will to There are seven standards that are examined in the excel and the will to win perdure. accreditation process. Schools are scored based upon These human qualities are larger how well they adhere to these standards. The visiting and much more important than team gave us the absolute highest ranking in six of the passing events that occasion the seven standards and the second-highest rank in them, just as the ebb and flow of our daily efforts add up to the other. These are extraordinary scores and seldom something greater and more enduring if they create within achieved by schools in so many categories. each one of us a person who grows, who understands, who It is especially gratifying to receive these results but really lives, who does not merely survive but who prevails to also hear their personal reflections on the school. It for a larger, more meaningful victory in time, and hopefully, isn’t that we are surprised to hear these results. It is just in eternity as well. really nice to hear them from objective professionals. I wish these were my words. They instead belong to Let’s face it; all of us here are sort of biased! the Reverend Theodore M. Hesburgh who wrote them In the site-visit team’s report, they identified these to his University of Notre Dame community in 1966, strengths found in their review of the school: after the Fighting Irish won the National Championship • Trinity High School makes all decisions based in football. This is the Hesburgh who stood shoulder to on data analysis. The school gathers, analyzes shoulder with Dr. Martin Luther King when it wasn’t and disseminates data to constituents in a timely always the thing to do, the college president who was and thorough manner. All of the data drive the decision-making process. CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE PRESIDENT’S NOTEBOOK President’s Notebook CONTINUED called upon by several U.S. presidents for important place and time. But let’s be clear: It is not about glorifying President’s n otebook civic work, and the priest who led Notre Dame for 35 victory at the cost of perspective. On the Monday after years from being a Midwestern spot on the map to the 2011 Shamrocks defeated Scott County 62-21 in the being the world’s most recognizable Catholic university. state Class 6-A title game in Bowling Green, the players His words serve to place our own school’s highly were back in class, wearing their neckties, and Coach Bob celebrated football season, in which we were ranked Beatty was in the classroom teaching Health and P.E.” No. 1 by several national pollsters, into the proper For those unfamiliar with Trinity, they might be context. surprised at Reed’s description of life at school after our We have the typed outline of Monsignor 21st football state championship and at least a share of Steinhauser’s notes of the first meeting with the first a mythical national championship. To those who know students who ever enrolled at Trinity. Item No. 3 on his Trinity, it isn’t a big surprise. 2 agenda for that meeting had to do with athletics. In a I am particularly pleased that in all of the media school full of boys, sports will be important. Monsignor interviews conducted during the football season you Steinhauser knew this. Zoom ahead to 2011 and we never heard a player or coach speak disdainfully of an see Coach Beatty, his staff, players, parents and fans opponent, none ever boasted selfishly and each always deserving much praise, specifically in how the school spoke glowingly of his team. This mirrors our great community dealt with the daunting football schedule, pride in the fact that Trinity is one of only 12 schools media attention and ultimate success. (out of 280) belonging to the KHSAA that have not LouisvilleCatholicSports.com, a local media outlet had a player or coach ejected from a contest in the past focusing on Catholic school sports, received permission three years. from Trinity to publish a book about the past football Being part of the football team is hard work. season. The result is a nearly 100-page story of the Workouts began in January, carried on in the heat season filled with color photos, an interview with of summer and continued through a schedule seen Coach Beatty and a forward by Hall of Fame journalist by some as the toughest in school history. Pride in Billy Reed. I particularly like this excerpt from Reed’s their work is palpable. Hats off to the team for their forward: accomplishment. “This is a book about perfection and fulfilling great I think the school has been able to take Monsignor expectations, the most difficult thing to do in football or Steinhauser’s acknowledged value of athletic any other endeavor. It’s about the fate that brings together competition (win or lose) and lived it in the framework the right coach and the right group of men at the right suggested by Father Hesburgh.