At The Classical Academy we aim to produce much more than superior academics and a nurturing school environment. By the grace of God, we seek to cultivate students who love truth, goodness, and beauty, and recognize Jesus Christ as the source. We seek to lead students to embody wisdom and virtue, and possess a lifelong passion for learning. We seek to nurture students to become thought leaders who shape the culture with the truth of the Gospel, who evaluate all human knowledge and experience in light of Scripture, and who use their education to further God’s kingdom.
We are learning in this journey of education that these things do not just happen. They must be cultivated, nurture, visited again and again, and in this case at the start of the school year intentionally placed on their shoulders.
We live in a day where our children don’t have many rites of passage, at least not many positive ones. Historically, cultures all over the world initiate their young people into maturity, placing them directly and purposefully into a rite of passage at a designated point in time. Our society has little, if any of this “call to action” of our children. Unless intentionally done by parents, our children don’t get to experience many “Rites of Passage” that signify a deliberate change in their journey, a call to greater responsibility and elevated purpose. Here at the Academy we would argue that young people are desperate for these charges given to them by those who love and shepherd them.
We started off the 2021-2022 school year with our annual Blazer Ceremony on the first day of school, launching our 9th grade students into leadership at The Classical Academy. Students were inducted in front of their 180 student body community, 24 staff members, school board members, and parents and family members. They were given their Academy blazers- a sign of leadership, as well a liturgy and a charge for the years ahead as leaders of the school.
Some may say leadership is earned, not automatically given, and in many ways, it is. But like with our academics, we place challenging material in front of our students that forces them to grow, change, think critically, and then impact the world around them. Why would we do anything different with how we teach them character and leadership? When you place students into leadership as a rite of passage, you tell them, “You are worthy. You are capable, and you will be held to a higher standard.” And guess what, they most often rise to the occasion.
The Head of School read a Liturgy for Students and gave each student leader an individual charge while their parents put the blazer on them.
As you wear your blazer we pray you will behold maturity and compassionate leadership, and be a shining example of the love of learning and the pursuit of excellence.
Be mindful not only of your studies, a joyful attitude, and a love of learning, but be also mindful of the needs of your peers, the student body, and even your teachers.
Respond with mercy to the failings of others.
Be a bearer of love and light and reconciliation;
Have patience to listen to others, and in humility learn from them.
Show compassion by considering their needs as your own.
Wear grace well in this place, remembering that you arrive here each day as an emissary of God’s Kingdom.
May the Kingdom of God be between you and every person here at The Classical Academy.
It has been a blessing over these first legacy building years of the school to watch our student leaders rise to the occasion. Our student leaders joyfully submit to school expectations and humbly guide our younger generation of students. They stand and address adults and visitors as they come into the classroom, maintain positive attitudes about their studies, open and hold doors, serve in the family line and grammar school classrooms, and joyfully engage their teachers and peers. This is what it’s about. You teach the younger generation how to approach life and the joy of learning by modeling and expecting.
It is a very different approach to tell your older students they must earn the spot of leader than it is to tell them, “You are the leader.” When we place our students here as a Rite of Passage, we can more easily guide, nurture, and instruct what it is a leader does. It leaves their dignity intact as they learn to lead, rather than stripping their dignity by saying, “You can’t have this position until you are good enough.” More often than not, the students rise to the occasion in ways that surprise and encourage us.
We were blessed to have our school board in attendance for this ceremony and for their prayers over these students during this Blazer Ceremony.
(adapted from Every Moment Holy)
May you learn to love learning,
For the world is yours,
And all things in it speak
—each in their way— of our Savior:
of His mind,
His designs,
His artistry,
His power,
His unfolding purpose.All knowledge is God’s knowledge.
All wisdom is God’s wisdom.
Therefore, as you apply yourselves to learning,
Be mindful that all created things
Are God’s creative expression, that all stories
Are held within His greater story,
And that all disciplines of order and design
Are a chasing after His thoughts–
So that greater mastery of these subjects
Will yield ever greater knowledge of the
Symmetry and wonder of His ways.
Along this journey, you have been blessed with teachers who are passionate
About the subjects they teach,
And with mentors who take joy
In awakening in you a fierce love for those
Parts of God’s creation and His story that they have already learned to love well.
If you apply yourself to those subjects
That you might at first find tedious,
Your efforts will be rewarded with new insights,
Fresh inspiration, small epiphanies,
And with the firm conviction that God
Is at work in your heart in all circumstances,
Not only broadening your knowledge,
But also shaping your heart by patience,
Endurance, and discipline
That you might mature to more fitly and humbly
Serve the purposes of God’s great kingdom.
As these students enter into leadership at The Classical Academy, we pray for a deepening knowledge of truth and finer discernment of the ideas they encounter in their studies.
Jesus, guard their minds always against error, and guard also their hearts against
The temptation to compare their own performance to the work of their peers,
And so to fall into either of the twin traps of shame or pride.
Grant them instead, that they might happily steward
What scholarly gifts you have apportioned them,
And that they might do so as means of preparing
Themselves for service to you and to others,
Grant them strength to live their identity drawn from your love and forgiveness, and not from their grades
Or accolades here.
Grant them discernment and wisdom,
Knowledge and understanding.
Lead them to truth and bless the labors of this new season.
Shape them for your service, Lord Jesus.
May they wear grace well in this place,
remembering that they arrive here each day as an emissary of your Kingdom.
