SIDNEY — New year, new leadership. In January 2019, Joshua J. Ater was named the new president of Lehman Catholic. With significant business leadership experience in marketing, sales, and development, combined with his passion for Catholic education, he’s focused on growing the school.
“We seek to live out the challenge of St. John Paull II who said ‘It is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be ground down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society.’ Our goal is to help every student discover how to ‘Be Great!’”
His report continues:
Dynamic faith opportunities
The students, faculty and staff at Lehman Catholic have the opportunity to encounter Christ each day through mass, adoration, prayer, service, faith-sharing and confession. This year the entire school went on retreat during the same week. The freshmen and sophomore classes participated in an off-campus retreat held at the Damascus campus in Centerburg, Ohio. The junior class participated in a service-focused retreat, and the Senior class participated in Kairos.
Additionally, the faculty and staff from Lehman Catholic, along with their peers at Holy Angels, Piqua Catholic, and St. Patrick, gather each month for School of Faith – a faith development program focused on growing personal faith with the goal of translating that growth back into the classroom.
Academic excellence and achievement
Lehman Catholic continues to meet the ever-changing academic needs of our students. The combined efforts of a driven leadership team and talented faculty have led to several exciting accomplishments in 2019:
• Fifty-seven seniors, 100 percent of the class of 2019, graduated from Lehman Catholic, and were awarded over $5,640,000 and accepted $2,994,200 in scholarships. Ninety-seven percent went on to college to study in more than 28 majors and three percent joined the workforce.
• Named one of Newsweek’s Top 5,000 STEM High Schools and awarded the Governor’s Thomas Edison Award for STEM Education and Student Research for being committed to teaching beyond the boundaries of the traditional classroom and pushing the limits of experiential learning.
A community where everyone belongs
One of Lehman Catholic’s cornerstone qualities is a welcoming community where every student is encouraged to grow in their unique gifts. Offering more than 30 athletic teams, music and art classes and leadership & civic activities combined, there is something for everyone. Here are just a few of our notable achievements in 2019:
• Lehman’s Teen Leadership Corps served our local communities by: donating 417 toys to Wilson Health, donating 38 Project Linus blankets to Dayton Children’s Hospital, sending more than 450 Christmas cards to active members of the military, and donating more than 5,000 pairs of socks to the Alpha Center in Sidney and Bethany Center in Piqua.
• Lehman’s Girls Soccer Team was named District Champions and ranked second in the state.
• Lehman’s Baseball Team was named Sectional Champions.
Improvements to enhance our learning environment
Together with generous donors and grants, we’ve completed the following improvements this year:
• Launched a new APP to enhance communication and provide digital forms allowing us to begin to eliminate paper permission slips, medical forms, et. al.
• Enhanced Wi-Fi has been placed throughout the building providing the needed infrastructure to allow every student to access the internet and full coverage in both gymnasiums.
• Installed a new intercom, phone, and clock system to provide stronger security and enhanced communications throughout the building.
• Introduced a new mascot and refreshed brand to support the Cavalier spirit.
• Dramatically transformed the classrooms and hallways on the ground level to modernize and enhance the appearance of our building.
To learn more about Lehman Catholic High School, visit LehmanCatholic.com.
