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Faculty News
Sister Veronica celebrates golden jubilee
Sister Veronica Volkmer, Pius X’s
religion department chair, is celebrating
her fiftieth jubilee of her profession of
vows this year. She joined the Marian
Sisters Community (formerly the
Mercy Sisters of St. Francis) in 1958.
“I remember the night when it
hit me what a great treasure our
faith is,” Sister Veronica
said. “I recognized that Jesus
understood every human need
and had given us a loving
Church that provided for those
needs. It was then that I decided
that I should do something with
my faith.”
Sister Veronica was born to
Leo and Laurine Volkmer and
was the first of seven children.
She graduated from St. Bernard
Academy (now Lourdes Central High School) in Nebraska
City in 1953 and attended Brescia College in Kentucky.
After teaching three years in public elementary schools, she
entered the convent upon making a weekend retreat in 1958.
After the profession of her first vows and teaching at St.
John’s School for a year, Sister was sent back to school to
receive a degree in secondary education with endorsements
in theology, philosophy, and English in 1963. She earned a
Masters in Christian Spirituality from Creighton University
in 1983.
After teaching two years in the Pauline Catechetical Center
in Holdrege from 1963-65, she was assigned to teach at
Bishop Neumann High
School in Wahoo for
eleven years. She left
Neumann to become
formation director
for the Marian Sisters
Community, a post
that she held for ten
years. She then served
at St. Andrew School
in Tecumseh for two
years before being
elected as the major superior of the Marian Sisters in 1988.
After serving two terms as superior, she went back to school
for a year to renew her teaching certificate before she began
teaching at Pius X High School in 1995, where she now
serves as chair of the theology department.
In reflecting on what things she has learned during her
fifty years as a Marian Sister, Sister Veronica is quick to
respond with “the power of prayer!” “I have seen so many
small miracles that have come through the power of prayer,
including a big miracle of my own recovery from cancer,”
she said. “I have in particular seen many miracles that have
come through praying the daily rosary.”
Three teachers to attend
Leadership Institute
Connealy & Schonewise receive
grant for Rwanda pilgrimage
English teachers Jane Connealy and Julie Schonewise
have been selected as 2010 Fund for Teachers Fellows.
The two educators wrote a grant proposal that will
fund $10,000 and allow them to travel on a religious
pilgrimage to Rwanda in August.
Jane Connealy, Tom Seib and Katie Elsener have been selected
to attend the Leadership Institute offered through the Holocaust
Educators Network and National Writing Project in New York
City. All three complete the “Reading, Writing and Teaching
the Holocaust” summer seminar. They will design and lead a
professional development seminar on teaching to Holocaust,
which will be open to all Nebraska teachers in the summer of
2011.
The two will travel with Immaculee Ilibagiza, author
of the book Left to Tell, which details her survival of
the Rwanda genocide. The pilgrimage will include
a retreat at Cana Center at the Shrine of Our Lady
of Kibeho, which was the cite of several Marian
apparitions to three adolescents in the 1980s.
Connealy and Schonewise will use this experience in
their classrooms and Ilibagiza will speak to the Pius X
student body next fall.
17 Pius Connections ❖ Spring 2010