“Happy Feast Day, St. Angela Merici!”

(Photo by Beth Donze, Clarion Herald; for additional photos, please visit the Clarion Herald’s Facebook page).

Ursuline Academy’s first and second graders marked the Jan. 27 feast day of their foundress, St. Angela Merici, by presenting an uplifting repertoire of songs to assisted living residents at Chateau de Notre Dame in New Orleans.

The pitch-perfect concert, performed by students in the chapel and accompanied by the youngsters’ guitar-playing music teacher, had the residents singing along to “Let There Be Peace on Earth,” “This Little Light of Mine” and “When the Saints Go Marching In.”

The young performers also sang and signed (courtesy of their classes in American Sign Language) an original piece written by an Ursuline student entitled “Insieme” – Italian for “Together.”

After the concert, the Ursuline students enjoyed fellowship time with the residents, completing coloring sheets featuring angels and slogans such as “He is Risen” and “Fear Not, For I Am With You.”

This morning’s visit to Chateau de Notre Dame was part of an annual academy-wide service day in which every Ursuline student in grades 1-12 gives service to her community in honor of St. Angela’s feast day and the Ursuline Sisters’ motto of “Serviam” (I will serve).

Ursuline’s feast-day celebration kicked off earlier this morning with a school Mass in the National Shrine of Our Lady of Prompt Succor chapel on State Street. After the Mass, students and their teachers fanned out over the metro-New Orleans area to complete grade-specific service projects for the following non-profits (in addition to the first and second graders’ outreach to Chateau de Notre Dame):

• Third grade: Sugar Roots Farm in New Orleans

• Fourth grade: Sunrise Assisted Senior Living in Metairie

• Fifth grade: Inspired Living, an assisted living community in Kenner

• Sixth grade: The Blake at Colonial Club, a senior living community in Harahan

• Seventh grade: Woodlands Conservancy, an environmental conservation organization in Belle Chasse

• Eighth grade: The Shirley Benson PACE Center in New Orleans

• Freshmen: The softball complex parking lot in City Park

• Sophomores: St. Michael Special School in New Orleans

• Juniors: Youth Rebuilding New Orleans, which helps to rebuild blighted neighborhoods

• Seniors: A project in Violet in conjunction with the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana