My Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Congratulations to our Eighth Grade Class of 2026 at Mary Our Queen who graduated on Tuesday.  We wish you the very best in your new beginnings in High School.  We concluded our school year at Mary Our Queen on Wednesday.  We would like to take this opportunity to thank all our teachers and staff for their hard work in making this school year a success.  We would also like to thank all our volunteers in school for all you have done. Your countless hours of service made a tremendous difference.  Without you, we would not have achieved what we have accomplished in the last few years.  This includes being named a National Blue Ribbon School.  We are looking forward to a new school year in the fall. To date, we have 656 students registered for our preschool and school year which will be the highest number of students ever enrolled in Mary Our Queen School.

This summer, our Family of Parishes will offer Vacation Bible School and the Tutus Tuus Program in the months of June and July.  Please see our bulletin for more information.

Now that we are in our summer months, these are the projects that will be done at Mary Our Queen.  First of all, we will be cabling our school classrooms so that we will be able to install a new intercom system.  This will Improve communications throughout our Parish Campus and better integration with security protocols.  This is made possible by a matching grant from the Lavigne Foundation.

With the matching grant provided, we will also be replacing our heating boilers at Mary Our Queen School.  Our current boiler system is over forty years old and well beyond its expected life span.  Replacing the boiler system will significantly improve our efficiency and address both operational needs and long-term stewardship of our facilities. With the relocation of the new boilers in the mechanical room in the Kenny Center, we will be removing the old boilers and converting that space to a storage room.

Through the Raise the Paddle funds from our MARQUEE and together with $10,000 each donated from MOQ Men’s Club and Knights of Columbus, we will continue the upgrading of our classrooms at Mary Our Queen School.  The classroom upgrades will include new flooring, ceiling tiles, lighting and a video projector in each classroom.  Over the last three years, we were able to upgrade the classrooms of the lower level of our school, and we hope to have all our classrooms in our main school building upgraded within three years.

The old vent fan in our gym broke down a few years ago. With the new HVAC system, we will no longer require its use.  As such, we will be removing the vent fan and sealing up both the interior and exterior walls where the vent fan is removed within the next two weeks.

We will be resurfacing the driveways on the east side of our campus this summer.  When we were resurfacing our entire parking lot last summer, I thought that resurfacing those driveways was not required for a few more years.  Unfortunately, with the deterioration, especially by the cafeteria, we have to bring forward the resurfacing of the driveway.

In regard to the bell tower at St John Vianney, after the initial review of the bell tower at St John Vianney, there is a recommendation to do a basic structural analysis of the tower framing to understand how the tower displaces due to design wind loading.  This analysis should help us to provide recommendations for repair and/or reinforcement.

We have retrofitted most of the lighting in the parking lot at St John Vianney with new LED lighting the last two weeks.  We are currently planning to retrofit all our existing bollard lighting with new LED lighting.  With more and more of the ballast on those lights burning out, retrofitting it with LEDs not only makes it simpler but also brings about cost savings in our electricity bill.

We continue to make improvements and updates to our Parish facilities.  These are some of the projects that will be done this summer for our Family of Parishes.

Blessings, Fr Marc

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