Meeting Day 1
Today was the first day of orientation meetings for all teachers. Yesterday was new teacher meeting day with the headmaster. Mainly a review of school philosophy and an opportunity to cover what we will say to parents on the first day about expectations, etc. Today was a benchmark for the school as a whole, really--a refocusing of the teachers and parents on what really are the foundational goals and principles of the school. The reason for the refocusing was a feeling that the school was slipping into "academic" mode. "But what is wrong with academics?" you might ask. Priority. You see, the focus of BRCCS is not necessarily high test scores, or mounds of factoids pounded into malleable heads--it is to graduate better people. In nurturing better people, you will of a necessity create excellent students, but it is a matter of what is the foundation. It comes down to what type of atmosphere the school should have--what are the non-negotiables of the "world" of the school. Today there were many answers: community, knowledge, wisdom, honesty, justice, mercy, excellence, respect, standards of behavior, courtesy, a nurturing environment, etc. In order to create and maintain this type of "world," however, the world must have the right foundation. Is that foundatiion academics? Probably not. In fact, no. The right foundation to support this world is. . .discipline. I know, I know: the image/thought in your mind is probably a negative one. Discipline=correction of wrongdoing. But that is only half of discipline. Discipline is also reward. Discipline is creating a a set of guidelines that contribute to the type of nurturing you wish children/students to receive.The type of nurturing that will, God-graciously, produce the type of people you wish to see. Thus, in order to create an environment full of excellence, nurturing and virtue you must create and enforce the rules that produce such an environment. (Enforcement being both consequences for missing the mark and rewards/priviledge for excelling.) An example of such a rule is Girls Go First. A new school policy is that the only reason a boy should be rushing ahead of girls in line, etc., is to open and hold the door for them. Think of the ramifications of this policy, the creation of respect for women it imparts in boys. And the response of "Thank you" from the girls imparts gratefulness for that respect.
By imposing such guidelines, the school creates a world in which better people are formed. By creating a foundation of discipline/nurturing (for it is truly nurturing), the school more easily facilitates the imparting of knowledge, wisdom and understanding--the trinity of true learning. By imparting knowledge, wisdom and understanding; the school creates not only good students who value learning, but also people to whom virtue, morality and character matters. And in reality, if a the goal of a Christian classical school is anything other than creating better, more Christ-like people, then it has missed that mark. Academics, as such, serves a purpose, but only in its place. To place it above and outside of discipline and the learning trinity is to create people with many factoids and no compass for life-application--the unfortunate product of many modern schools, even Christian ones, sadly. At any rate, I appreciated the paradigm/ perspective shift. It fits impeccably with both classical philosophy that fits learning and living together and Christian philosophy that puts spirituality and life together. And certainly fits with my philosophy that education is inseparable from creating thoughtful people who know who to feed their trinity of being. And without discipline all that is merely a pipe dream.