What's the point?

I am sure that you have asked yourself at some point, "does all this effort to send my child to a private, Christian school really pay off?" Or perhaps at some point you have tried to explain your decision to friends, family or neighbors who ask, "so, why do you send your child to a private, Christian school?" We ask these same questions here at SFCS: why do parents choose to send their children to Shannon Forest? More importantly, why should parents choose to send their children to Shannon Forest? It is these types of questions which allow us to continually evaluate and better our school, and ultimately our students.

Obviously, we talk about standardized test and SAT scores. Clearly, we examine college acceptance rates and trends. But even as important as these indicators are, they are not the most important measurements of true student success. Our mission at SFCS states that we will "equip and challenge students to influence culture and society for Jesus Christ." Ultimately, we are concerned about more than academic preparation; we are concerned with the type of person we graduate. Can we, in partnership with parents and the local church, equip and challenge young students to influence culture and society for Jesus Christ?

Recently, I have come across local and national articles discussing the efforts that both public and private secular schools are taking to prepare their students to graduate as "nice", "good", or even "moral" people. This may sound like the same vision as SFCS upon first glance, but upon closer examination, one realizes that is not the same at all. The recurring theme in the efforts of these other schools is a belief that the key to success is the production of moral, virtuous students. Again, this idea looks an awful lot like the mission of our school, but in truth, it is merely a cheap counterfeit. The essential difference between our mission and theirs is that they are attempting to produce virtuous young adults through a worldview that says ‘there is no God’, ‘there is no absolute truth’, and subsequently, no real right or wrong. They have no authority on which to base their efforts and in the end it is merely secular humanism.

Further investigation shows that by and large this approach fails. Check any longitudinal study, any Gallup Poll, any Barna Group Study and you will find a continual degradation of values. Of course, this makes sense when you take into account the fact that no one ever seems to be able to agree upon their values. Best case scenario, this approach will produce a "moralistic, therapeutic deist", as introduced in Soul Searching:"The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers" by Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton. So, what makes SFCS any different? Godly men and women, skilled in their craft, who daily have the opportunity to speak unique Biblical truth into the lives of our students. Does it make a difference? I believe so, and so do the majority of our graduates. In fact, over 90% of our recent graduates have said that SFCS not only prepared them for college, but also prepared them spiritually for life. 

If you really want to answer the question, 'why do you send your child to a private, Christian School?' then I recommend two actions: firstly, get involved with our school and see firsthand the reasons why we do what we do. Secondly, check out this informative study conducted by a Canadian research group on American schools, private secular versus private Christian. 

 

This study, the largest of its kind, clearly shows the differences between the stated goals and actual results of the various types of schools available in the United States. I am convinced that if you take the time to complete both steps one and two, you will know without a doubt why you choose to send your child to SFCS.