Skip Navigation

Rockbridge Academy Blog

Posts Tagged "classical Christian education"

The Good, The Beautiful, and Cursive

February 04, 2025
By Sarah Reardon, Class of 2020

Such a concern for beauty reveals the values underlying a classical educational model and their distinction from the values of a modern educational model. We believe that education aims at the good, true, and beautiful. If education aims to train students in beauty, then the form of education, even down to the letters with which we write our spelling words, ought to likewise aim at beauty.

Some weeks ago, as I was explaining my role as a teacher at a classical Christian school to several peers, we began to discuss the topic of cursive. I lauded the grammar-age children at my school, who use cursive for nearly all their daily work. “But why is cursive good?” a peer then asked me. I was tempted to answer that cursive is good because it is beautiful, but I knew such an answer would not satisfy him. Though I wished to be able to rattle off five clear reasons why writing in cursive is better than print handwriting or typing, I could not, and, as such, my peer’s question forced me to reflect.

In my reflections since our conversation, I have thought several times of Wendell Berry. Wendell Berry is a writer whose stories and novels often revolve around themes of community, place, and tradition; I was first introduced to Berry by Rockbridge’s own Mr. Vaughn. 

Berry attempts to resist a life of screens and machines. In this resistance, he writes his books by hand, and his wife types his work on a typewriter. In his short but widely-circulated essay “Why I am Not Going to Buy a Computer,” Berry expresses his distaste for computer companies and other companies of their ilk, saying that he wants to be “as little hooked to them as possible.” Yet Berry’s argument against computers relies on the fact that he, as a writer, does not want to use a tool that degrades his work instead of improving it. Berry writes:

“My final and perhaps my best reason for not owning a computer is that I do not wish to fool myself. I disbelieve, and therefore strongly resent, the assertion that I or anybody else could write better or more easily with a computer than with a pencil. I do not see why I should not be as scientific about this as the next fellow: when somebody has used a computer to write work that is demonstrably better than Dante’s, and when this better is demonstrably attributable to the use of a computer, then I will speak of computers with a more respectful tone of voice, though I still will not buy one.”

Now, I’m not sure if Mr. Berry writes in print or in cursive, but his preference for handwriting over typing makes a statement about his beliefs. Berry believes that some forms of writing—and living—are more conducive to truly good work, to the genuine expression of beauty and truth, than others. Berry believes that innovation and ease are not sure means to the end of good work. Berry’s stance suggests, too, that form matters: how we work has an impact on the fruit of our work. How we write has an impact on what we write. 

Instinct attests to the above proposition. We know that form matters: without question, we know that a lecture attended in a classroom, given by a teacher whom we know, will be more memorable than a lecture viewed on YouTube. The former allows us to receive the speaker’s wisdom more directly, due to our shared presence in the classroom. While the latter may be more accessible, its form is not as conducive to learning. Likewise, we know that a poem printed in a bound book will command more of our attention than an Instagram post claiming to be poetry. As many have written, a conversation in person is more likely to have a deeper and more personal effect than a conversation over messaging software.

In short, the meaning of a thing relies in part upon the form of that thing, the way that it is communicated. Or, in the famous words of media critic Marshall McLuhan, “the medium is the message.” We know that the medium or form of anything impacts its meaning, and yet we often neglect to recognize the implications of such a principle. But this principle has implications for many areas of our lives—from evangelism to education, and even in handwriting.
Cursive, as a form of handwriting, ennobles the written word in a way that type, and even print writing, do not. The form of cursive lends significance to the written content. This is part of why classical Christian schools emphasize cursive, a skill otherwise considered outdated and unnecessary. 

Cursive, as a form of handwriting, ennobles the written word in a way that type, and even print writing, do not. The form of cursive lends significance to the written content. 

In a classical Christian school setting—like that of Rockbridge, where I was educated, or that of the school in Pennsylvania where I recently taught—we want to teach our students that their work is important. What students at these schools write is not mere chicken-scratch. What students write are not simply notes to be thrown away. What students write is, instead, an integral part of and a representation of what they are learning. Some of their assignments are more important than others—composition paragraphs are more important than extra math calculations, completed on “scratch paper.” But all of their work is still important. And because we want to teach children that their written work is a vital part of their education, we teach that it is important that the form of that work‒‒that is, the students’ penmanship‒‒be well-ordered, and not only well-ordered, but beautiful.

Such a concern for beauty reveals the values underlying a classical educational model and their distinction from the values of a modern educational model. We believe that education aims at the good, true, and beautiful. If education aims to train students in beauty, then the form of education, even down to the letters with which we write our spelling words, ought to likewise aim at beauty.

A friend of mine, herself now a teacher at a classical Christian school, put it this way: “A century ago, penmanship was a significant part of school curriculum, with methodologies, textbooks, and handwriting drills devoted to it… Emphasizing excellent penmanship in the school setting would train students in a teachable skill that brings a sense of beauty back into learning.” Penmanship itself is an art, one little talked of today. Like any art or skill, penmanship requires a dedicated effort and time, but it also produces rich rewards.

For instance, studies show that cursive not only activates different areas of the brain than print writing, but that it develops more fine motor skills than print writing or typing, because, as one teacher writes, cursive letters “must be connected in a smooth and continuous motion. This can help students develop their hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills, which can have benefits beyond writing.” 

In addition to the “sense of beauty” brought by cursive penmanship, secondary benefits of cursive have been marked by researchers and teachers alike. For instance, studies show that cursive not only activates different areas of the brain than print writing, but that it develops more fine motor skills than print writing or typing, because, as one teacher writes, cursive letters “must be connected in a smooth and continuous motion. This can help students develop their hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills, which can have benefits beyond writing.” Cursive can also help children retain more of the information they are learning, as an article from Time magazine tells.

Apart from its usefulness, cursive brings beauty and even joy. How excited students are when they can finally sign their name in cursive! How proud they are of a neat page of cursive writing! A thing well done is a delight, and so, too, is a thing well-written.

I, too, have felt this delight. Before I began teaching grammar-school students, I had to refresh my memory of cursive. It came back to me easily, as I had been well-trained in penmanship as a grammar-school student at Rockbridge but slowly lost my handwriting skills when typed assignments became the norm in my education. Since taking up cursive again, I have found all my written work to be not only more beautiful but more enjoyable. A thing of beauty—even something as seemingly inconsequential as penmanship—is, as the poet John Keats once said, “a joy forever.”

Perhaps my instinctual response to my friend—that cursive is good because it is beautiful—was not, after all, so far off the mark.

This essay originally appeared in Voegelin View. The above version was edited slightly.

Sarah Reardon (née Soltis, Class of 2020) taught at a classical Christian school in Philadelphia. Sarah graduated from Grove City College in 2023, and her writing has appeared in publications such as First Things, Plough, Public Discourse, among others.
 

Posted in Grammar

Art, of Course! Four Tenets of Classical Christian Art

November 20, 2024
By Therese Cooley, Upper School Art Teacher

In art, we are ultimately educating students toward a deeper knowledge and love for God and our neighbor. We are teaching a fear of the LORD which is the beginning of wisdom (Proverbs 9:10). In Hebrew the word for “wisdom” means “skillful with the hands,” evoking handiwork done with care and knowledge.

Rockbridge Academy has a weekly art course, from grades 1 through 8 as well as a chosen elective for grades 7 through 12. We invest time in the schedule, space in the building, and money in the budget. We grade participation, memorization, worksheets, and projects. Art is taught classically at a grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric level. We know this high view of art education is counter-cultural since we witness art and music being the first courses that drop during a time, space, or budget crunch. Yet, here it is, art as a cherished part of education, not as a “second recess.”  John Ruskin said, “Fine art is that in which the hand, the head, and the heart of man go together.” Thus, classes elicit the student’s concentration and diligence, encouraging their best work with carefulness and neatness. In this environment students can produce their best work with a sense of delight: “Aaah, I did that—and it is good!”  This sentiment should evoke thoughts of our Creator. An inescapable fact of our humanity is that we bear the image of God and thus have a deep desire to create good work with joy and thanksgiving. Genesis 1:31 states, “And God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good.”  In this article I describe four attributes or goals of a classical, Christian art education. There may be more, but these stand out as foundational. Thus, I am calling them the four tenets of a classical, Christian art course.

1.  See and Apprehend God’s Glory

The first tenet of a classical, Christian art education is to help students see and apprehend God’s Glory. That is, to show the excellence of His character and providence in our finely-tuned, complex creation. The Westminster Confession of Faith states, “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” There is true enjoyment in gratefully appreciating God’s creation, learning to observe it well with joy. Theologians describe two “books” of God’s Glory: Creation and Scripture. Psalm 34:8 and Psalm 19:1-4a state:

“Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good!
   Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!
  
The heavens declare the glory of God;
 The skies proclaim the work of His hands. 
Day after day they pour forth speech, 
 night after night they reveal knowledge.
They have no speech, they use no words;
  no sound is heard from them.
Yet their voice goes out into all the earth,
  their words to the ends of the world.”

In art, we are ultimately educating students toward a deeper knowledge and love for God and our neighbor. We are teaching a fear of the LORD which is the beginning of wisdom (Proverbs 9:10). In Hebrew the word for “wisdom” means “skillful with the hands,” evoking handiwork done with care and knowledge. As students learn to carefully observe the world, they perceive its intricate complexity. They notice patterns, symmetry, proportions, rhythms, ratios, and harmonies. Students witness the Golden Ratio, the Fibonacci Sequence, and many varied sophisticated designs in forests, feathers, and our double-helix DNA strands, for example. All of creation speaks visually of our gracious, kind Creator who is all-powerful, sovereign, and trustworthy. Students may begin to understand why the angels, the Seraphim call to one another, “Holy, Holy, Holy is the LORD Almighty, the whole earth is FULL of His Glory!” (Isaiah 6:3).

2.  Understand the Flow of Art History

The second tenet of a classical, Christian art course is that it is based on the flow of art history. Here is another view of God’s story. Students can begin to understand the progression of world views through history as they are seen in various cultures’ artwork. For example, how do we know what the Egyptians believed to be true or important except through the art which is left for us to observe and study? And consider, is there a reason why one art era moved to another? As we study reactions to various world views, we can see what could be happening as the philosophy of cultures change through time.

Students also notice that some aspects of humanity are similar throughout time and space, pointing again to our Maker. For example, all over the world, and since the earliest of times, mankind has sought a God or gods, felt closer to Him or them on a mountaintop, and felt a debt, a need to sacrifice, to give to this higher power. Where did all this come from? Ecclesiastes 3:11 says, “He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”

The students witness themselves being part of an extremely large picture. They gain an understanding of the foundation and rise of Christianity. They realize they are not alone, they live in community, in a continuum of time, connected to a legacy of thought. It is like witnessing a very long conversation with many members from the beginning of time. This aspect may not seem important but consider that one of the goals of public education is to dispel this truth. John Gatto was awarded New York Teacher of the Year in 1990 and 1991. His revealing book, Dumbing Us Down describes his classes this way: “The first lesson I teach is confusion. I teach everything out of context… I teach the un-relating of everything. I teach disconnections. I teach too much: the orbiting of planets, the law of large numbers, slavery, adjectives, dance, surprise guests, pull-out programs, standardized tests… What do any of these things have to do with each other?” Their goal is for students to witness disconnection and confusion, not order and harmony. I recall Dostoyevsky’s revelation in The Brothers Karamazov, “the awful thing is that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there, and the battlefield is the heart of man.” Consider now that an objective of public education is to use various subjects to purposely instill chaos, confusion (babel), not connection, peace, or wisdom. This is an intentional strategy of the enemy to dismiss the beauty of God, including the beauty of creation and divide the community we have with one another.

3.  Integrate Other Subjects with Art

This is where I declare that I have the BEST job at Rockbridge Academy: teaching art! Various parts of all subjects come together in our art lessons revealing an orderly whole. These connections are unavoidable and they are unexplainable without considering the work of a powerful Creator…Look for it with me—there is art in every subject and every subject in art.

And here we have a smooth segue to the third tenet of a classical, Christian art course: Integration. Rather than disintegration, art lessons reveal integration across subjects. Truly, we live in a universe, not a pluriverse. As teachers, we are intentional in revealing integration. This is where I declare that I have the BEST job at Rockbridge Academy: teaching art! Various parts of all subjects come together in our art lessons revealing an orderly whole. These connections are unavoidable and they are unexplainable without considering the work of a powerful Creator. We’ve already seen a connection of art with history, geography, philosophy, and Bible. Consider also the many Latin root words we review. Proportion is a stem of “proportio” meaning an analogy of parts. Duplication is to draw something a second time. Chroma is color. Primary colors are the first ones. The list goes on and on. Additionally, we often have math lessons. We teach value as the weight of black and white, or of a color. We literally work on geometry while studying shape, form, perspective, and ellipses. We also consider science since artists study nature to draw it well. It wasn’t too long ago that to be a great scientist you had to be a great artist—drawing what you saw in the natural world. Artists were chemists as well, mixing their own paints. We connect our color and composition lessons easily with music: rhythm, patterns, harmony, disharmony. After all, tone is color. I recall my daughter describing a lesson her music teacher at the time (Mrs. Ball) gave to the choir, “that is a bright red tone, try to make it more of a mauve…” This instantly communicated a more correct harmony. Finally, as art teachers, we require our students to write well, not just with proper spelling and grammar, but with their neat handwriting. Look for it with me—there is art in every subject and every subject in art.

4.  Teach Skills of the Craft

Lastly, the fourth tenant of a classical, Christian art course is simply that we teach definite skills of the craft. In other words, we do not hand students a blank paper and ask them to draw whatever they feel. Oh, how overwhelmingly self-conscious and intimidating that could be. Rockbridge Academy’s art curriculum is purposely drawing-heavy. Our lessons begin (and continue) with, “draw what you see, not what you think you see.” Students grow in their ability to patiently draw with accuracy. They may grow-up to become an artist or they may just need to confidently draw what they see in a microscope, doing so without fear, being able to gain an even deeper understanding of what they are seeing by drawing it correctly.

Classical in nature, our art education involves students imitating forms in life and duplicating other masterpieces. They grow throughout the curriculum and move toward greater sophistication. We seek to generate enthusiasm, joy, and wonder as well as provide lessons in real skills for the students to practice, real information for them to learn, sensing a real love that we have for them as our students and for God as LORD of creation, and God of Wonder.

All this work and wonder is wrapped up nicely in the spring when the Rockbridge Academy community comes together to enjoy the Fine Arts Showcase. Don’t miss it.

Take a look at the past Rockbridge Academy Blakey Prize winners HERE. 
 

Therese Cooley, upper school art teacher, has been a part of the Rockbridge Academy faculty and staff since 2006. She has also taught grammar school art and the photography elective and helped with the yearbook and communications over the years. She and her husband, Roger, have five Rockbridge alumni children and four precious grandchildren. 

1 comment

Athens, Jerusalem, and the Pentagon

November 10, 2024
By Chip Crane, PhD

In this age more than ever, our service members need to think independently, to fight and serve with wisdom, to think critically, and to communicate effectively in nuanced situations. The call to serve is truly a call to love, something Scripture teaches we cannot do without God. A classical Christian education will teach students—if they pay attention—to love. 

Like many parents at Rockbridge Academy, I did not grow up with a classical Christian education, but I am grateful that my children have. I first heard about this approach to schooling in 1996 from friends involved at Rockbridge in its early years. I was six years into my Navy career at the time, and that initial introduction to classical Christian education planted a seed that, years later, led to enrolling our four children at Rockbridge.

I have often envied the education my kids received at Rockbridge. Though I am no longer on active duty, with two sons who have graduated from Rockbridge and are now in the Navy, I have been reflecting on how classical Christian education prepares one for service in the armed forces. It is common for a given graduating class to have at least one or two—sometimes more—who enlist after high school or attend college at one of the service academies or through an ROTC scholarship. In fact, Rockbridge currently has nearly 40 alumni who are veterans, which represents over 9% of our graduates. (The national average, according to one DOD statistic, is that .5% of high school graduates go on to serve.)

Classical education combined with a worldview rooted in the Scriptures cultivates a healthy thoughtfulness that we might see more as a path to the contemplative life. One might wonder whether the military culture’s emphasis on STEM, cutting edge technology, high-speed action, ambition, and clearly defined metrics for success are at odds with the classical curriculum’s emphasis on linear history, Latin, logic, public speaking, and its traditional arts and sciences course work. Furthermore, how do taking Bible classes every year and learning to follow Christ line up with serving in a secular, government-run, and potentially violent organization such as the military? Do the compassion, wisdom, and Christ-rooted love we seek (and see) in our graduates have a place in our twenty-first-century military?

I believe the answer is a resounding yes; in fact, I’ll argue that a classical Christian education is an excellent way to prepare young men and women for service in the military—and indeed in all walks of life. The Rockbridge curriculum’s emphasis on linear history and related arts and sciences, on communication skills, on the three stages of learning in an integrated curriculum and the understanding that “the heavens declare the glory of God,” that all knowledge and honor belong to God, and that “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,” provide a rich foundation for serving in uniform.

Leading with Understanding 
Rockbridge students learn history, philosophy, and literature in chronological periods. This linear view of what happened from ancient times to now; of what stories, songs, and images people created as those things were happening; and of what they thought it all meant teaches students many things useful in the military. They learn that one age responds to and bears the fruit (good or bad) of the one before it; they learn that beliefs and decisions have consequences, and even that the art and ideas we share have roots thousands of years back. In addition, students learn that God is orchestrating the events of history and the cultural movements over time in a glorious display of His character and as an expression of His love. Most students across our nation do not learn these things. As mainstream culture seeks to exclude God and any sense of a greater story, a meta-narrative, people grow increasingly in love with the non-linear, the random, the disconnected sound byte.

The classical curriculum also integrates the different subjects better than the progressive mainstream educational model. Students at Rockbridge read the Iliad while learning about the Peloponnesian War, and they study early American history in parallel with Emerson and Thoreau. The rigors of Latin for eight years keep those ancient roots in view, while training their minds to think carefully and make connections. Math and science are presented biblically as an exploration of what God has created and revealed of Himself in the marvels of nature.

How does a member of the armed forces benefit from this view of history and the integration of academic disciplines—and of faith? Someone serving and leading in our armed forces will make wiser decisions for understanding what has happened in the past. Knowing military history can help understand the why of a present conflict or strategic direction. Even more, learning to see the cause and effect in not only the flow of history but in changes in the arts and philosophy—indeed in man’s view of God himself—equips sailors and soldiers to understand everything as connected to its past. Military leaders will make wiser decisions and care better for their troops if they see situations and people—even technology itself—not in isolation but as connected to past events and ideas. Furthermore, understanding mankind—knowing that God has made people in his image and imbued them with a dignity far beyond what our Constitution recognizes, and knowing that we have a military because people are fallen—is the starting point for truly serving and leading other men and women.

Communicating with Clarity
A second priceless preparation for military service lies in the communication training—the many, sometimes painful (for student and parent!) writing assignments and oral presentations a student at Rockbridge experiences. I have witnessed firsthand the growth in both skill and confidence students gain as they draft complex written arguments and prepare for graded discussions and thesis presentations. Many soldiers, sailors, and marines—whether enlisting straight out of high school or through college commissioning programs—struggle to write and speak effectively.  As high-tech and action-focused as military training and operations can be, none of those things can be planned, arranged, orchestrated, or executed without written and oral communication. Writing instructions for a troop insertion, opening the day with a short talk to the platoon, evaluating sailors on their performance, briefing your department head on an event, and composing a letter of congratulation or condolence all require a foundation in these skills. Those who can do these things well will keep their people and the nation safer.

Serving with Biblical Wisdom 
Finally, a classical Christian education puts our future military leaders on the lifelong path to gaining a heart of wisdom. The progression from the grammar stage to the dialectic to the rhetoric prepares students to learn any subject and grounds their outward-facing adult life in real knowledge and not simple conjecture and emotion. A classical education can help students apply their knowledge to the real questions and situations of life—including the hard decisions and intensity of the military.

The classically educated J.R.R. Tolkien, a Christian and World War I veteran, wrote The Lord of the Rings during World War II with a son in training with the Royal Air Force. The soldier and leader of men Faramir—portrayed by Tolkien as more noble of heart than his elder brother, Boromir—tells Frodo and Sam, “I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend: the city of the Men of Numenor; and I would have her loved for her memory, her ancientry, her beauty, and her present wisdom.” Faramir understands how warfighting fits into a larger picture of the world and does not see it as an end in itself. Too often in history, military men have made power or achievement an end rather than a means. Even in peace time, some military members become enamored with the mechanics and technology of power itself rather than the good they can protect. Several chapters later in the tale, we get a further glimpse of Faramir’s character as one of his soldiers, Beregond, describes him to Pippin: “He is bold, more bold than many deem; for in these days men are slow to believe that a captain can be wise and learned in the scrolls of lore and song, as he is, and yet a man of hardihood and swift judgement in the field. But such is Faramir.”

In this age more than ever, our service members need to think independently, to fight and serve with wisdom, to think critically, and to communicate effectively in nuanced situations. The call to serve is truly a call to love, something Scripture teaches we cannot do without God. A classical Christian education will teach students—if they pay attention—to love. The modern war fighter (or service member who supports and defends in ways other than fighting, such as in the Navy Supply Corps) needs clarity of direction and vision, needs to understand why he or she is firing a weapon, dropping a bomb, disposing of a bomb, spending hours at a computer terminal, hiking miles across rugged terrain, fixing an engine, or operating a drone. Far from mere technical skills, they need wisdom to make decisions, power to act and to restrain, and love to truly care for their troops to defend the United States of America.

Chip Crane, PhD, is a retired Navy Supply Corps officer and Principal Lecturer in the English Department at the University of Maryland, where he teaches professional writing and a course called Tolkien in Oxford. He is also co-author of The Naval Institute Guide to Naval Writing and a communication and teamwork consultant for the federal government and private sector. He and his wife, Sonmin, have four children who all attended Rockbridge Academy; two are currently serving in the Navy. 
 

Posted in School Culture
1 comment

28 Faithful Years of Life Together

October 23, 2024
By Sonmin Crane, Communications Manager with Roy Griffith, Headmaster

Mr. Roy Griffith, our headmaster, started his journey at Rockbridge Academy in 1997 as a 5th grade teacher joining this start-up classical Christian school. That marked the third year of the school and already it had grown from 23 students the first year to nearly 100. Few people had ever heard of classical education and even fewer of classical Christian education (CCE). Rare indeed were those willing to stake a career on it when no Rockbridge graduates even existed, and we had never taken a Grand Tour before. 

Did this educational methodology actually work? We know the answer today is a resounding, yes, as CCE is now a fast-growing movement. But what was Mr. Griffith thinking 28 years ago? What led him to change careers from an architect to 5th grade teacher? What changes has he seen in CCE, and how is Rockbridge Academy poised to approach the next 30 years? Mr. Griffith shares his story, some of the challenges of the early years, and some words of advice to those just starting their classical Christian educational journey at Rockbridge Academy.

What were you thinking 28 years ago when you changed careers from an architect to a 5th grade teacher with four young children? 
When I came to Rockbridge Academy, my wife, Donna, and I were chasing our first two of eventually, four kids and were deep into learning how to parent as Christians. Ever since we had brought our oldest home from the hospital, one thing persistently tugging on our souls was the conviction that if Ephesians was telling us to bring up our children, "in the fear and admonition of the Lord," it required us to be all in.  We quickly awoke to how central education would be to forming not just their minds but the heart convictions our kids would carry into adulthood. So when I visited Rockbridge Academy during their opening year in 1995, I walked in thinking about an eventual school for my boys, but walked out personally captivated by the classical Christian vision. A thoroughgoing K-12 discipleship of the mind and heart anchored in the sovereignty of Christ and embracing the role of the whole family resonated in my soul. Months later, I couldn't get that vision out of my head, and I really believed the Lord gave me a burning desire to be part of that mission as a teacher. It wasn't an easy decision, as it meant long hours and a significant pay cut. When I proposed the career change to my wife, she responded wryly, "Well, we can try anything for a year." It was a defining moment. God has His ways, as one tentative year turned into twenty-eight.

So when I visited Rockbridge Academy during their opening year in 1995, I walked in thinking about an eventual school for my boys, but walked out personally captivated by the classical Christian vision. A thoroughgoing K-12 discipleship of the mind and heart anchored in the sovereignty of Christ and embracing the role of the whole family resonated in my soul. 

How did you experience God's faithfulness as you took these steps of faith?
The early years were hard but rewarding. I had never before thought I would be a teacher, or thought I had a knack for it. But the Lord hollowed out a little space just for me, and I flourished in the classroom. At the same time, like many start-up Christian schools, all the teachers at Rockbridge literally worked below the poverty line, which had its own stresses. Meanwhile, God surrounded us with a precious school community who cared for our family. Food would show up at our door unannounced. Families took us along on their vacations. I remember one Christmas, a Rockbridge family left a gift anonymously at our front door each night for two weeks leading up to the holiday. We tried hard to catch them in the act, but they were really stealthy. It was both hilarious and heartwarming, and while we had our suspicions, we never found out who it was. My kids were spellbound by the surprise each night. Through it all, both the rewarding moments and the times of greatest stress and difficulty, we look back and see the Lord's hand. As I've come to realize, when God called us to this, He began a discipleship not just of my kids, but of our whole family.

 Through it all, both the rewarding moments and the times of greatest stress and difficulty, we look back and see the Lord's hand. As I've come to realize, when God called us to this, He began a discipleship not just of my kids, but of our whole family.

What were some of the challenges you and those early teachers and administrators faced?
The greatest challenges by far came because none of us had been classically educated. While we were standing on the shoulders of a few slightly older schools trying to do the same thing, everything had to be built from scratch. From curriculum and lesson plans to traditions like feasts and history parades, to figuring out how to shape distinctively classical and Christian music and athletics programs, teachers and administrators were constantly trailblazing. Pioneering is tiring, often hard on relationships, and always fraught with mistakes. We look back on lots of mistakes. (We still make mistakes.) I think the Rockbridge Academy Core Values we articulated distilled from many hard-fought lessons in those early years and helped define who Rockbridge Academy has always aspired to be. 

Have you seen the classical Christian education model change over the last 3 decades?  
I would say that the classical Christian model itself has not fundamentally changed in three decades. Rather, I think our collective understanding of this education, one that had to be recovered from the distant past, has grown tremendously. In light of that fact, I think we have learned to approach the act of educating classically far more humbly than we used to.   

Some would argue that true classical education cannot exist without Christ. What are your thoughts? 
At the risk of losing any of our aforementioned humility, I'd say, "absolutely!" But to back up, answering this question requires us to think historically. Certainly, the educational model of ancient Greeks and Romans developed in a pagan context, and those societies raised some of the greatest philosophers and statesmen in Western History. Early Christians saw what a powerful tool the Greco-Roman culture had developed. But they also realized that all good things only come by the common grace of the Creator, and that Jesus Christ is sovereign over all knowledge. So what we know today as classical education with all the beautiful trappings is something brought to its fullness in the Christian Middle Ages, which purposely threaded the model with deeper truths of the Scriptures. So, while it's possible to just teach classically, we need to remember how empty the wisdom of the world can be. 

How do you see Rockbridge Academy growing and poised to contribute in the next 30 years? 
We are in an exciting time in classical Christian education. The resiliency of this model of education compared to others became very apparent during COVID, so classical Christian schools and homeschool tutorials are now popping up everywhere and flourishing. Because Rockbridge Academy has almost 30 years of trial and error in this space, God has positioned us to have a leading impact on this part of God's kingdom. In many ways, that is already happening through our Summer Teacher Training Conference, hosting classical Christian student teachers, and our semi-annual spring ACCS Auxilium conference for start-up schools. We are actively collaborating with greater organizations like ACCS (Association of Classical Christian Education) and SCL (Society for Classical Learning) to expand upon that influence. But as we too experience growth within, our campus is only so big. I tell people, I never want our campus to grow so big that I can't eventually learn everyone's name. So that means further growth could take many forms, including supporting the classical Christian homeschool movement, planting a satellite campus, or expanding specialized programs for both neurodivergent students or students with more profound disabilities. This is why we must remain prayerful. I'm confident the Lord will lead in a way that causes Rockbridge Academy to continue to accomplish its mission to Christian families.   

What advice do you have for young families and teachers starting their CCE journey at Rockbridge Academy?
Go to church. Study God's Word. Actively pray. Raise your kids in the fear and admonition of the Lord with intentionality. Love on your children's teachers and get to know them. Walk humbly before God as you figure out who your kids are, and once you think you have, prepare for them to change as they grow. Know that doing all of these things, including sending your child to a Christian school is not a formula for success; it is simply acting as obediently as you can. So finally, trust God with the results of each day and each decade they are under your roof.  

Roy Griffith joined Rockbridge Academy as a 5th grade teacher in 1997. He transitioned to grammar school principal in 2012 and then in 2015 took on the role of interim headmaster to headmaster in 2016. Roy's wife, Donna, has served in various roles in Rockbridge history and today uses her gifts in multiple areas of coaching and care coordination for the elderly. Roy and Donna's four children are Rockbridge alumni: Elyse (2019) living locally and finishing her business degree at UMD, Grace (2018) married to Nathan Harrison (2017) and living in Charlotte, NC, Drew (2015) married to Anna (Krauss, 2015) living in Phoenix, AZ, and Nate (2013) married to Emily (Comeau) and teaching upper school science at Elizabeth Seton High School in Bladensburg, MD.  

Posted in School Culture
1 comment

A Part of Our Rockbridge DNA: A Reflection on Faculty Morning Prayer

October 10, 2024
By Sam Ostransky, Upper School Literature and Theology Teacher

As students come into the building each morning, they hear a strange sound echoing throughout the hallways. It's an unfamiliar sound in schools and buildings to be happening at 7:30 in the morning: sometimes louder, sometimes softer, and sometimes a higher or lower pitch. And then it abruptly stops about three minutes later. The sound comes from Mrs. Kennedy's Physics classroom. But the students hear it every day, so they no longer raise their eyebrows and ears to figure out what it is. It's completely normal to them.

What the students hear each morning is the sound of their teachers singing a hymn a cappella. Since the door is left ajar, the sound travels. From the entrance of the school, you can just make out murmurs set to pitch; as students walk further into the building, the words become more recognizable. School hasn't started yet, so students are unloading book bags and already nibbling away at their lunches, casually hanging out with friends with heels up on their locker doors. To them, hearing adult men and women singing full voice is not strange to them. It's just what their teachers do.

#87: Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty! / Early in the morning our song shall rise to thee; / Holy, Holy, Holy, merciful and mighty! / God in three Persons, blessed Trinity!

Each morning the Rockbridge faculty and staff gather together to sing a hymn and pray together for our students, families, and alumni. This is absolutely one of my favorite things we do. Here's how we do it.

When the bell rings at 7:30, someone picks out a number from a blue Trinity Hymnal. We've all picked one up from a bookrack as we've entered, so we're ready. It's a bonus when we're accompanied by a piano or a flute, but we're normally a cappella. Some of us try to sing harmonies—others succeed. And if it’s one of those hymns with the extra verses written beneath the final music staff, we sing all the extras too.

The collection of blue Trinity Hymnals with a solitary gold cross on the front have been gifted to us from various churches as they have updated to the newer red hymnals of the same design. Inside the front cover are stamps of the names of the donating churches. That our hymnals which allow us to sing together do not all come from one church but from several reminds me of the fellowship of families which belong to a myriad of church congregations and denominations but come together to form one Rockbridge. The Trinity Hymnal has been a new hymnal to me, but it has nearly all of my favorites.

#122: O ye heights of heav'n, adore him; / Angel hosts, his praises sing; / All dominions, bow before him, / And extol our God and King.

That our hymnals which allow us to sing together do not all come from one church but from several reminds me of the fellowship of families which belong to a myriad of church congregations and denominations but come together to form one Rockbridge.

After singing, we pray for current Rockbridge families and for alumni, selecting about five or six families each day. There's even a binder labeled "STAFF MORNING PRAYER LIST" to make sure we don't miss anyone, moving alphabetically through a roster of family names throughout the year. If you are an alumni, please know that we still pray for you by name. Your teachers delight in remembering you. For current families, please know that we pray for your entire household by name. As an Upper School teacher, praying for Grammar School students is how I have come to know the students who will one day be in my classroom.

If you are an alumni, please know that we still pray for you by name. Your teachers delight in remembering you.

We also take prayer requests for the faculty and staff for the day. It is here that we have shared in some of the greatest joys in each other's lives while also lamenting the greatest of sorrows. In a way, to pray for someone is to truly know them because it is to properly see them, their joy, or their sorrow in relation to God's ever-present care. Similarly, to be prayed for is to be known. It has meant so much to me on the days when I have asked my colleagues to pray with and for me.

 It is here that we have shared in some of the greatest joys in each other's lives while also lamenting the greatest of sorrows. 

The hymn, the prayer requests, the fellowship of prayer. This all happens in about ten minutes. And I'm so glad it does. It would be so natural to start the day together but to do so merely for the sake of making announcements and reminders about the day. And while we do sometimes have those, the focus is on preparing our hearts for the people and the learning of that day. As the school begins to be filled with students, it is also filled with prayer asking God to guide, to protect, to nurture our students.

I wanted to know when this rhythm began and how it had evolved, so I went about asking those teachers who were starting school days fifteen, twenty, or twenty-nine (!) years ago. All of them said the same thing: it’s one of those things that everyone remembers doing but doesn’t remember when or how it started. It struck me that singing to God and praying to him are just a part of the DNA of Rockbridge. Just as we don't remember learning to brush our teeth or how to tie a knot, at Rockbridge we sing to God and pray to him because it is part of the fabric of who we are.

#492: Take my voice, and let me sing, / Always, only, for my King. / Take my lips, and let them be / Filled with messages from thee.

 It struck me that singing to God and praying to him are just a part of the DNA of Rockbridge. Just as we don't remember learning to brush our teeth or how to tie a knot, at Rockbridge we sing to God and pray to him because it is part of the fabric of who we are.

 

Posted in School Culture

Education Must Be More Than Just Classical

September 19, 2024
By Sarah Reardon (nee Soltis), Class of 2020

"Virtues are hard things,” quipped National Review writer Daniel Buck in a recent opinion article entitled “The Virtues of Classical Schools.” Buck continued: “Fail a test of courage or act unwisely and virtue will demand justice or forgiveness. Values are subjective, virtues objective. The former is a preference, the latter a firm statement of right and wrong, true and false, good and evil.”

Examining one Hillsdale-launched classical charter school, Lake County Classical Academy (LCCA), Buck argues that although classical schools bear some similarities to their public counterparts, classical educators stand apart from our culture in that they are not afraid to incorporate structure and objective values into their pedagogy, policies, and classroom life.

As a graduate of a K–12 classical Christian school and a current teacher at another classical Christian school, I appreciated much in Buck’s article. Indeed, while much of public education rests on slippery, subjective foundations, classical education can rest on objectivity and uphold structure and hierarchy in the classroom in a way that benefits students and prepares them to comprehend truth and virtue.

Yet, as I finished Buck’s article, I couldn’t help feeling that he failed to explain significant attributes of the school he profiled and the classical-education movement in general. For instance: Who gets to define what virtue is, what “right and wrong, true and false, good and evil” are? What is the foundation from which these schools draw the objective truths they teach? For public charter schools such as LCCA, these questions cannot be fully answered, since such questions require a religious framework. One cannot define goodness and truth apart from an ultimate source of goodness and truth.

One cannot define goodness and truth apart from an ultimate source of goodness and truth. 

Classical charter schools like LCCA have bloomed around the country, thanks to Hillsdale’s Barney Charter School Initiative and to the success of programs such as Great Hearts Academies and Valor Education. But the origins of today’s classical-school movement — origins that Buck did not mention — lie in a distinctly Christian understanding of classical education. As Emma Green documented in an extensive New Yorker article published earlier this year, today’s classical-education movement began with four Christian schools inspired by the vision of education held by Dorothy Sayers, a Catholic, and launched in the 1980s. In the 21st century, classical education has grown more pluralistic, thanks to the rise of classical charter schools and private classical schools without religious affiliation.

But classical education without Christ is not only oxymoronic, it is futile in an ultimate sense. 

This portion of the article was republished with permission. Click HERE to continue reading Sarah Reardon's article in the National Review

Sarah Reardon (class of 2020) is a graduate of Grove City College with degrees in English and classical studies. She wrote for GCC's newspaper, The Collegian, and the cultural magazine, Cogitare Magazine. She has contributed articles to Front Porch Republic, The American Conservative, National Review, and several online literary magazines. 

Posted in School Culture

Unexpected Lessons on Grand Tour

April 25, 2024
By Jessica Wenger, Class of 2025

Grand Tour is a very unique experience that Rockbridge Academy students get to enjoy. On this academic trip, students spend two and a half weeks traveling to many parts of Greece and Italy such as Athens, Corinth, Rome, Sienna, and Florence. They get to actually see the places that they have learned about for so many years and understand the way the ancients thought through the physical things they left behind. True to the classical Christian method, though, the goal of Grand Tour is not merely to grow students intellectually, but to teach students to trust in God's redemptive work. God taught me many lessons through my experiences on Grand Tour. He did this through revealing my sin, showing me His abounding mercy, and exemplifying His greatness.

The first way that God worked in me on Grand Tour was through revealing my sin to me. Through this He gave me the opportunity to grow as one of His children. While on Grand Tour, we were in a new city almost every night, away from home, taking in large amounts of information, and constantly spending time with our classmates. While all these things were great blessings, they also opened the door for certain temptations. After conversations with some of my classmates, I found that many of us struggled with the sin of comparison. God made each of us uniquely and blessed each of us in different ways, but so often I found myself coveting the talents, relationships, and reputations of my peers. This is not the way that a child of God who has been blessed so much by Him should behave. 

God helped me to fight this temptation through journaling. Mr. Keehner required us to write one page of reflection on how we saw God at work each day. This process kept me from dwelling in my own thoughts and forced me to write them out and think about how I should respond in light of what Christ had done for me. I needed to rely on His sovereign will in order to learn contentment.

Another lesson that God taught me while I was on Grand Tour was how His mercy applies to my day-to-day life. While we were on the bus one morning, Mrs. Ball read to us Psalm 103:10, which says, “He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.” Now as a Christian, I already knew this, but I had not been living as if I knew it. I knew that God would not condemn me because Christ had been condemned for me, but I lived holding my breath, waiting for God to send temporal consequences for my sin, which would, no doubt, ruin my trip. One evening I realized, as I was looking out at the sun falling beneath the Adriatic Sea, that God had blessed me with yet another amazing day, yet I had fallen short of what He called me to time and time again. The verse that Mrs. Ball had read came back to me, and I was brought to tears by the abounding mercy of God. Each day He continued to delight in blessing me when what I really deserved was punishment.

The last way that God grew me on Grand Tour was through exemplifying His greatness. When I sat at the top of the mountain at Delphi and looked out over the sprawling mountain ranges, the misty olive groves below, and the wildflowers which grew out of the face of the rock, I realized how small everything in my life was in comparison to the greatness of God. It brought back words to my mind of a song that I had not sung since I was in elementary Sunday school. While the words of this song are so simple, I continued to meditate on the mysteries behind them for the rest of the trip.

Lord, You are more precious than silver;
Lord, You are more costly than gold;
Lord, You are more beautiful than diamonds,
And nothing I desire compares to You.

Lord, Your love is higher than the mountains;
Lord Your love is deeper than the seas;
Lord, Your love encompasses the nations,
And YET, You live right here inside of me.

It truly is amazing that a God so vast and great dwells in the souls of sinful mortals like us. He continues to sanctify us through His holy word and the experiences we have in our lives. He graciously reveals to us our sins, but readily showers us with mercy. His greatness is revealed to us through all His works, and I was truly blessed to have seen him at work in such a unique way on Grand Tour. 
    
 Jessi Wenger is a senior at Rockbridge Academy who has been a part of the school since she was in kindergarten. Her favorite areas of study are theology, literature, and philosophy. In her free time, she enjoys participating in performing arts, such as the Rockbridge musical and variety show, along with taking and teaching dance classes. She also enjoys writing poetry, cooking, reading, gardening, and making homemade soaps and candles.

Classical Christian Science: Competency Plus Virtue

March 07, 2024
By Robyn Kennedy, Upper School Science Teacher

"Science is the search for the truth.” 
– Linus Pauling, founder of Quantum Chemistry & Molecular Biology

Imagine a medical student memorizing cardiovascular system pathology for his licensing exam. Picture a pilot polishing up her landing skills in an aircraft simulator. Think of a teenage boy playing a car-racing video game.  When does the medical student learn compassion for his patients? How does the pilot train for the courage that gives her a steady hand? Which game module teaches the adolescent driver good judgment? All three scenarios present a person who has trained for hours, weeks, or even years honing the skills necessary for their vocation; yet all three are missing elements essential to their roles. In contrast, a classical Christian education seeks to develop the whole person from competency to relationship to virtue. At Rockbridge, science classes are no exception.

Consider a scientist who has completed all the necessary education to be a leader in her field. She is familiar with cutting-edge research, and she has the analytical skills to design and build solutions. But in which class did she learn to appreciate the complexity of real-world problems? What research did she do on the ethics of her specialty? How much training has she had on written and oral communication to experts and decision-makers in the broader world? Modern scientists are trained to be competent, but lack preparation in interpersonal skills and moral character.

Science knowledge has exploded in the last century. The reflex response in education has been to cram more technical skills into the science classroom. In contrast, a liberal arts education is larger than the mere transmission of technical information. Modern classical science aims to combine practical knowledge with transformation of the social and personal aspects of a student’s character. As a classical Christian school, Rockbridge Academy pursues this transformation in light of biblical truths which develop the student as a bearer of the imago Dei.

In the dialectic years, students cultivate disciplined mental habits through systematic training in logic and Latin. As they move into rhetoric science, the focus shifts to developing habits in both computational and analogical thinking. While memorization and repetition are important, we eschew any method that limits learning to regurgitation of facts and algorithms in order to pass a test.  Robust learning must be held in tension with contemplation, wonder, rest, and connection to the narrative of science, the story through which we see God’s incredible creation.

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others as more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.
– Philippians 2:3-4

The prevailing secular model for bright students seeking to make an impact on the world is a laser-like focus on areas of self-interest: grades, accolades, and individual accomplishments. As Rockbridge students build a foundation of scientific competency, we seek to create an environment which is truth-seeking for the benefit of the whole, not advantage-seeking for the benefit of the one. Rhetorical skills in speaking and writing are developed and used to teach and mentor others. Students are encouraged to ask questions about science and faith as they practice thinking deeply and putting difficult thoughts into words. They are led to see their developing abilities in the light of humility and stewardship: the humility of seeking truth rather than seeking rewards, and stewardship of the earth as we partner with God to be redeemers of culture and creation.

Foremost, our goal for the students at Rockbridge Academy is to guide their journey into full personhood. From the early days of grammar school until the final year of rhetoric, science students are encouraged to order their loves as they seek knowledge. We worship the Creator and have confidence in Him alone. We learn with boldness and purpose, not with fear of an unknown future. Our posture toward truth is one of awe as we see the Creator’s fingerprints on all of creation. We pray for students to leave these halls with every part of their education integrated into a whole, harmonious person: able to fulfill God’s call as stewards of creation, liberated in the freedom of Christ.

 

Robyn Kennedy has a degree in chemical engineering and a background in manufacturing and data acquisition systems. She teaches upper school science at Rockbridge Academy. Her husband is a retired Navy captain, and she and her family have served our country for many years at duty stations all over the world and around the country. She has four children and three of them are currently students at Rockbridge Academy.

The Roots of Rockbridge Academy

January 24, 2024
By Olivia Reardon, Class of 2022

Like most great things in this world, Rockbridge Academy was born out of a problem. In 1994, a few like-minded couples with children reaching school age began to ask the question, “How are we going to educate our kids?” These parents desired a Christ-centered education for their children, yet as they surveyed Maryland's education landscape, they found it severely lacking. Not willing to settle when it came to their children, and especially their children’s relationship with the Lord, these couples set out upon a journey that led to the founding of the school we know and love today. Out of prayerful consideration, dedicated work, and God’s faithfulness, Rockbridge Academy came to be.

Out of prayerful consideration, dedicated work, and God’s faithfulness, Rockbridge Academy came to be.

Rockbridge Academy was founded by Rob and Laura Tucker, Dave and Kim Hatcher, and Mark and Kathy Lease: six parents with strong faith and a clear mission. One of these founders and mother of two Rockbridge graduates, Laura Tucker, says she and the other parents “desired to have a Christ-centered education for [their children] and godly training that reflected their training at home.” Tucker imagined a situation in which the training her children received at home and at school flowed seamlessly together, all pointing toward Christ. Jana Trovato, a parent of five Rockbridge graduates who became a part of the Rockbridge family in its third year, explains that this would look like “subjects taught under the Word of God, from teachers and staff that love God, who loved what they taught, who were aiming to live faithfully to him and to encourage their students in their relationship to Christ.” Clearly, an education in which Christ is foremost was important to Rockbridge founders and early families.

Clearly, an education in which Christ is foremost was important to Rockbridge founders and early families.

With this mission in mind, these parents began to prayerfully consider their options. Trovato cites Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning by Douglas Wilson as a resource that greatly influenced the start of Rockbridge. Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning provides a practical approach to the principles of classical education as outlined by Dorothy Sayers in her essay “The Lost Tools of Learning.” Trovato explains that Rockbridge is “classical in the sense of teaching all subjects via the Trivium: grammar, logic, and rhetoric stages, consistent with the ages of the children and their development stages, in giving the students tools of learning, a love for learning, for life-long learning.” These concepts come straight from Sayers’ essay. Additionally, classical education is focused on educating the students’ hearts and minds. Heidi Stevens, who began teaching at Rockbridge in 1997 and is now a board member, says that “the emphasis on human formation that runs through classical education's content-rich curriculum invites students to seek wisdom and virtue while maturing as whole and able people.” Here was the model of education that would both teach their children academics and nurture their character in submission to God. Now that these couples had their mission and their plan, all that was left to do was pray that if it be His will, God would provide the means to build a school.

Here was the model of education that would both teach their children academics and nurture their character in submission to God.

As one might imagine, starting a school from nothing and no money takes much time and hard work, and the path to establishing Rockbridge was far from straight. Nonetheless, God provided at every turn. Tucker explains that “in July before Rockbridge Academy opened, God provided three teachers with one as a Head of School, and they knew they were not promised a paycheck. Nonetheless, they were convinced that classical Christian education was crucial, and they desired to be a part of it.” One of these teachers was Jen Schingeck, who was convinced to join forces with these founders by reading Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning. In addition to teachers, the founders were searching for a building to house their school. Schingeck explains that the Baldwin Educational building was willing to rent the bottom room of their building to Rockbridge, but it needed renovations. So Rockbridge met at Riva Trace Baptist Church until the renovations were complete. Tucker says, “God provided everything just in time for the doors to open in September 1995. It was truly His work, and He made it clear by keeping the six founders on their knees until the last minute asking Him to provide.” Through the hard work of these founders and God’s faithful hand, Rockbridge Academy opened its doors in 1995 with 23 students K-4th grade.

Through the hard work of these founders and God’s faithful hand, Rockbridge Academy opened its doors in 1995 with 23 students K-4th grade.

Although this was a momentous occasion, it did not mark the end of difficulty and hard work. The first year proved exhausting for these teachers as they taught many subjects and grade levels and developed curriculum. And the teachers were not the only ones sacrificing time and energy for this school; it truly was a community endeavor. Tucker comments that “throughout the first year, [parents] volunteered to sweep the floors and clean the classrooms because they were grateful and delighted to watch their children learn in this classical Christian setting.” But in the midst of these hardships, God continued to provide. He provided people happy to serve their children and their community, the resources needed for the students to continue learning, monthly paychecks for the teachers, and enough students to keep the doors open. In fact, by the second year, God had tripled student attendance. And Rockbridge only continued to grow from there.

Now, 29 years later, it is easy to look back and see God’s faithfulness throughout the life of Rockbridge Academy. The Lord faithfully provided our own campus where over 400 students now learn and fellowship together. Trovato echoes the six founders' vision when she says, “From the beginning, the desire and vision was to build a school that would be for generations, not only for our children, but for our children's children; for generations to come.” Mr. and Mrs. Trovato are able to see the beginnings of this vision as they have a grandson currently in 3rd grade at Rockbridge. Additionally, the Lord continues to provide amazing faculty and staff who all desire to train up the next generation in submission to Christ, of which Jen Schingeck and her husband, Bob, are still a part. The Schingecks’ five children now attend Rockbridge, and Jen notes that “one of the sweetest most amazing things was realizing that in those years that I sacrificed my time and resources to the Lord by working at Rockbridge, the Lord’s plan was for my children to eventually benefit from that work.” God’s faithfulness is always at work, often in ways that we cannot even imagine.

 “From the beginning, the desire and vision was to build a school that would be for generations, not only for our children, but for our children's children; for generations to come.” 

These founders’ vision, mission, and hard work as upheld by God’s faithfulness are the roots of Rockbridge Academy. Although the founders’ idea began as a little mustard seed, their tender care and God’s providence sent its roots down deep and branches high. As our branches continue to soar heavenward, as Rockbridge continues to minister to God’s people, it is my prayer that we never forget the roots that uphold us, for without them this school would never be. In the midst of the Lord’s abundant blessings, let us remain on our knees forever, thanking and praising God for His faithfulness.

 As our branches continue to soar heavenward, as Rockbridge continues to minister to God’s people, it is my prayer that we never forget the roots that uphold us, for without them this school would never be. In the midst of the Lord’s abundant blessings, let us remain on our knees forever, thanking and praising God for His faithfulness.

 

Olivia Reardon, class of 2022, currently attends Messiah University where she studies English, education, and dance. When she is not tutoring at the Writing Center or performing with Messiah's dance ensemble, she can be found reading, spending time with friends, and eating ice cream.

Posted in School Culture

To Love and Understand: The Classical Vision in Controversial Times

January 10, 2024
By Taylor Craig, Class of 2014

A decade ago, I was in my senior year at Rockbridge Academy. A lot has happened in that time, but through it the things I learned here have been a significant and treasured influence in my life. While I would be remiss not to remark on the dear mentors and close friends I made here, I want to focus this brief reflection on the vision of the world I learned from Rockbridge, with an eye to how it eventually landed me where I am now, in the theological academy.

When Nietzsche wrote that “Whoever really wishes to become acquainted with something new (whether it be a person, an event, or a book), does well to take up the matter with all possible love,” he was only repeating something that classical educators had known for millennia—that the process of learning is first a moral, and then an intellectual endeavor, or rather, that any distinction between moral and intellectual endeavors is as specious as the anthropology it undergirds is facile. 

This paradigm is deeply entrenched in the Christian intellectual tradition. The Greek Fathers understood the intellect as a desiring faculty that intrinsically (if often unconsciously) sought after God and was fulfilled only in prayer; in the Latin west, Augustine’s trinitarian theology (tragically neglected by American Christians in recent years) emphasized that the very structure of the human mind pulls it towards its one end: the worship and enjoyment of God. 

This is the anthropology at stake in the classical understanding of education as moral formation and within which tools like the Trivium can flourish. Its profundity is that it reflects an entire vision of the world as the theater of God’s glory. Education is formation because curiosity is a form of generosity, of hospitality towards the new and the strange; but this is merely the anthropological reflection of the objective fact that all created truth and goodness beckon us onward to the eternal wellspring that is Truth and Goodness: God—Who is Himself Love. The only light that illumines truth is the generous light of God’s creating goodness sealed in the steadfast love of redemption. And as in the archetype, so in the ectype: for Christians, to know must always mean to love.

This is the anthropology at stake in the classical understanding of education as moral formation and within which tools like the Trivium can flourish. Its profundity is that it reflects an entire vision of the world as the theater of God’s glory. 

In other words, classical and Christian are not separable modifiers of education, but a cohesive way into studying the basic and unifying God-ward-ness of the world. We study the classical texts as Christians, not out of abstract adherence to a canon, but because in that canon we can inherit the practiced eye of centuries of Christians who have repeatedly and delightedly found that God’s truth, goodness, and beauty precede them there. These texts provide a fertile training ground for the virtues of wisdom, patience, and generosity required for learned cultural engagement today, indeed, for any faithful Christian walk—which is only the repeated referring all our lives to the giving and grace of God. 

In other words, classical and Christian are not separable modifiers of education, but a cohesive way into studying the basic and unifying God-ward-ness of the world. We study the classical texts as Christians, not out of abstract adherence to a canon, but because in that canon we can inherit the practiced eye of centuries of Christians who have repeatedly and delightedly found that God’s truth, goodness, and beauty precede them there. 

Indeed, it is those who thought that Christ and culture were most sharply opposed who likewise opposed the reliance on Greek models inherent to classical education. Conversely, Paul models the classical vision in Acts 17, in seeing that God got to Greece before him, and his job is to name the unknown God, in whom the Athenians already knew that they lived, and moved, and had their being. Similarly, the first Christian apologist, Justin Martyr, argued that Plato had dimly pointed to Christ, that Jesus was the proper fulfillment of the way of the Stoics—that it was the Christians who followed true philosophy. Christians have always most profoundly challenged the cultures around them by finding seeds of the Word and by naming Jesus Christ as the true fulfillment of those seeds. 

On a personal note, these themes have been the common thread (perhaps the only one!) in my own continuing education. Studying theoretical physics at MIT, I found that a guiding intuition of much of this research was that the elegance of a theory is not just an arbitrary aesthetic value but also an indicator of the depth of penetration into the mysteries of the universe. Truth, goodness, and beauty coalesce at precisely the point where being itself becomes most transparent to the properties of its Creator. 

Similarly, my study of theology at Yale, integrating as it does philosophy and cultural studies, would make little sense if one did not believe that all the activity of man’s mind is animated by the restless heart searching for rest in God, and that that search must leave its mark on all knowledge. Indeed, this most recent trajectory felt like the response to the turmoil of 2020 that would be most faithful to the vision Rockbridge has given me: to leave my stable job in finance for the life of the mind pursued in service to Christ; with the faith that commitments to justice, to generosity of interpretation, and to truth are always finally commitments to God Himself; and in confidence, alongside Paul and Justin, that the sharpest apparent conflict of worldviews opens upward in the possibility of the most incisive work of the gospel.

Similarly, my study of theology at Yale, integrating as it does philosophy and cultural studies, would make little sense if one did not believe that all the activity of man’s mind is animated by the restless heart-searching for rest in God, and that that search must leave its mark on all knowledge. 


This is not to say that classical Christian education is fundamentally optimistic about human culture. Quite the opposite: if God is the proper end of all intellectual activity, then the subjects of education can be corrupted by human rebellion far more pervasively than if these studies were something morally neutral. But the conditions of this corruption are also the possibility of restoration. Evil is always parasitic, and thus only parasitic—masking an ever-prior God-ward-ness. The constructive, God-centered vision of Christian education means that “the culture” as such can never be the enemy. 

The great method or technique of this ongoing discernment can only be the imitation of God’s love. If the goodness of the world stems from the generosity of God, then it is to evoke our generosity as well. Nietzsche continues: One “does well to take up the matter with all possible love, and to avert his eye quickly from all that seems hostile, objectionable, and false therein—in fact to forget such things; so that, for instance, he gives the author of a book the best start possible, and straightway, just as in a race, longs with beating heart that he may reach the goal.” If the God who is Truth is also Love, then formation in His image is the only possible pedagogy.

Taylor Craig, Rockbridge Class of 2014, is in his 3rd year of a master’s degree in Theology at Yale Divinity School, where he also works as a research assistant to Prof. Miroslav Volf. He is especially interested in trinitarian theology, early Christian interaction with Greek thought, and postmodern theologies of culture and language.

 

Posted in Upper School

Loving Words and THE WORD

October 05, 2022
By Heidi Stevens, Rockbridge Academy Board Member

The following is adapted from a speech delivered by Heidi Stevens on September 29, 2022, at the Rockbridge Academy Library Grand Opening. 

Long before Rockbridge Academy opened its doors in 1995—with three teachers and just shy of two dozen students—a small group of families gathered to dream and plan what a school like this could be. The founding families met together, read together, and prayed together, talking about building a place where our children could thrive and grow, where they could learn in an environment committed to academic excellence that encouraged them to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.

We loved our own children, of course, and dreamed of how a school like Rockbridge could come alongside and complement what God called us to as parents: training the children He’d given us to love their Creator with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. 

We also spent a lot of time talking about how what we were building should be built on a firm foundation that reached beyond our own generation. We spoke of cultivating a “500-year vision” for a place that would serve the parents of our community in educating our children’s children, and their children, and the children for generations beyond, if God would graciously bless and prosper the work.

In addition to talking about those things, you might be surprised to learn how that group of men and women regularly prayed for YOU. They prayed for you, and for your children, even as they went about the arduous work of building a school for their children.

Of course, we who were part of that younger Rockbridge Academy prayed fervently for our own children. But we knew that it was the next generation—and all the generations to come, long after we were gone - that would prove whether our work had been built on the right foundation or on shifting sand.  Consider the communion of saints—across time—who prayed for YOU, the Rockbridge parents of the future! You were prayed for: that you would be found faithful in seeking to raise your children in the fear and admonition of the Lord. 

There were so many other things prayed for, But one thing—of particular significance for this night—was the prayer that the future students at this school would be lovers of the Word … and lovers of words. 

● Words! The means by which God chose to reveal Himself to His people, even before His incarnation as the Living Word.  
● Words! The amazing vehicle of language through which so much of our learning happens. 
● Words! The mysteriously powerful, beautiful medium through which we can bless or curse, bring healing or hurt, speak life or death.
● Words! The avenue of our understanding, the tool through which we read and speak truth, and the stuff of which stories are spun to captivate, delight, and lead.

And so, we dreamed of a library: of the smell of books and the lure of comfortable chairs; of a repository of the most wonderous stories and the greatest ideas of mankind; and of a gathering of the collected knowledge of God’s good Creation that has yet only begun to plumb the depths of its extravagant complexity.  

We envisioned our children, and the many children to come, being enamored by tales of adventure that would whet their appetites for the real adventure of reigning and ruling as dearly loved sons and daughters of our Eternal Father King.  

We smiled to think of our students being brought up on tales of bravery and valor, of justice and love, and all the other noble things that the truest and best stories are both made up of and point to. 

We longed for our children to recognize the great Story behind all good stories: the story of a King who is making all things right again and restoring his original pattern of what’s Beautiful, Good, and True.

I was listening to an interview the other day with Carolyn Weber, whose memoir, Surprised By Oxford, is currently being made into a motion picture. Dr. Weber has been on the faculty of prestigious colleges across the United States and Canada, and she was the first female dean of St. Peter’s College, Oxford. She recently moved to middle Tennessee to begin teaching at New College Franklin, a small college that teaches the seven liberal arts—the trivium and the quadrivium—from a Christian perspective. 

Knowing her vast experience but recognizing that many of the students she now teaches would likely have been classically educated, the interviewer asked Dr. Weber if she saw much difference between those young men and women and others from more traditional school backgrounds. Her answer struck me.  She said that the classically educated students, for the most part, could “think in the dark”  in a way that many of her past students couldn’t. 

“They know how to think in the dark. They can think unplugged,” she said. “They don’t need Google and they don’t need gadgets.” 

That description struck me, because it’s what we hope for in our students, isn’t it? We want them to be able to engage with what they read, regardless of genre, on its own terms. We want them to be able to open a book without opening their computers. To be able to dive in without needing the “light” of predigested information that will tell them what to think before they’ve even begun. 

Will this library create that sort of student by itself? Will a library ensure that we have students who can “think in the dark”? No. But it’s evidence that we believe that sort of student will routinely inhabit these halls.

We want our students, who’ve been trained to read in such a way, to have this place to come and experience the riches you see around you. To be lovers of words who come here to be with—to pursue—ideas made incarnate on these printed pages. May they do so, reminded of that more excellent Word and truer Incarnation who came to be with—to pursue—us.

Heidi Stevens taught art and humanities courses for twenty years and now serves on the Rockbridge Academy Board of Directors. She and her husband, Rick, have two grown daughters, both Rockbridge graduates.
 

Posted in School Culture

A 300-Year Vision

January 06, 2021
By Melanie Kaiss, Staff Member and PE Teacher

What do you have planned for 2321? Before you answer, make sure your mind hasn’t auto-corrected that number. The question is not, “What have you planned for the year 2021?”, but in fact, “What have you planned for the year 2321?”  The question casts a vision beyond paying off the mortgage, finally taking that trip you’ve been saving for—across the country or around the world, beyond cleaning out the attic (oh, yeah, you did that during COVID), or reading “War and Peace.”

Well, if you don’t have a 300-year plan, the ACCS does. And you are already part of it. The ACCS is the Association of Classical Christian Schools. If your child attends Rockbridge Academy, or any other member school, then your family is part of a generational plan to change and redeem our culture, to restore Christian norms and standards that were once the hallmark of a flourishing society.

I got “on the plan” roughly 20 years ago when my husband and I first discovered classical Christian Education (CCE). When we joined the Rockbridge community in 2002, we heard often of this kind of very long-term thinking. At one school dinner, the story was told by way of illustration, of a group of oak trees planted at Oxford University for the specific purpose of providing new roofing beams in the dining hall centuries hence, when the trees maturity and the roof’s wear would dovetail in this ideal replacement plan. The story is considered myth by some, but even so, the illustration is no less impactful, especially for a community of believers whose God thinks and speaks in just such long terms. God promised to deliver his people out of Egypt after 400 years of slavery, and He sent his son, the savior of the world, into first-century Palestine after a 400 years of silent anticipation. For a God outside of time, centuries and generations take on a different meaning.

Former Rockbridge parent and board chair, Stu Caton, cast a similar vision of time before a group gathered at the Evergreen campus in October 2019 to celebrate the start of Rockbridge Academy’s 25th year. He told the group not to think of this 25th year, but of the 50th year and beyond; not of bringing their children to school, but of driving down Evergreen road to bring, or pickup, or see a history parade with, their grandchildren. Classical and Christian education is always about looking ahead, casting forward, looking to the horizon, expectantly “Look[ing] further up. . . further in” (C.S. Lewis) for the realization of God’s plan.

Which brings us back to the ACCS and your part of the plan. Consider your child[ren] generation one, if you will. Then look ahead two, or three generations. If you are convinced that your children are being uniquely educated to appreciate truth, goodness, and beauty; to think and speak clearly from a biblical worldview, all the while affirming the integration of all creation by God’s making, then you must thrill at the idea of being part of that legacy and seeing the legacy deepen and widen. And that’s why the ACCS exists—to see the growth of CCE and the kind of impact that will ultimately change our world.

If you haven’t visited the ACCS website recently, do it. Maybe you can already easily explain CCE. You did your research and ended up at Rockbridge following thoughtful and thorough decision-making. Even so, a visit to this website will give you renewed encouragement and stimulus about why you are here.

In practical terms, the ACCS is, “The primary public advocate for classical Christian education.” The organization offers, “a wide array of services that help build distinctive schools, [and]. . . provide accountability through accreditation.” In short, “The ACCS seeks to set an educational standard for a unified and directed approach to classical and Christian learning.”

But what makes classical Christian learning such a worthy pursuit? Read on to find out that progressives in the early 20th century set out to deliberately undermine our educational system and its classical Christian heritage. And the plan worked! Fast forward a hundred years and, “The ideas behind classical Christian schools are foreign to modern educators.” That’s because, “progressives worked to remove Christian ideas and purposes from the classroom.” But the ACCS affirms, and by extension, so do you, that CCE’s, “transformative power lies in one truth:  Christ is Lord of all.”

So, “What does that mean for how we live?  How we think about things?  What we value and what we love? In short, education is primarily about what we are trained to love, not just what we are taught to know. Put another way, education is about soul formation, not information. And this formation builds a culture.

To further promote culture-building among ACCS member schools, the ACCS sponsors several contests and awards, including the Blakely Prize in Fine Art and the Chrysostom Oratory Competition. Rockbridge Academy boasts five Blakely and seven Chrysostom winners among its alumni, going back to the inception of these competitions in 2015.  These students reflect not only the excellence of our teachers in instructing and cultivating an expression of truth, goodness, and beauty, but the students’ excellent ability to embrace and express these same virtues. The speeches and artwork are themselves are like redemptive cultural artifacts.

The ACCS does a host of other things, from training and certifying teachers, to cultivating relationships with like-minded businesses and higher educational institutions. They also host an annual conference called Repairing the Ruins, which our school participates in.  The organization tracks and promotes the success of students in member schools, and has developed The ACCS Initiative, an effort designed and being implemented to expand CCE nationally over the next decade. When you do visit the ACCS website, I encourage you to read through the tabs under “About ACCS” and “What We Do.” Your own vision will be refreshed, and you will be encouraged about the real potential for change that you are making possible, through your own child, and generations beyond.

Visit the website for ACCS here. 

Posted in School Culture

Recent Posts

2/4/25 - By Sarah Reardon, Class of 2020
1/22/25 - By Brenna St. Cyr
11/20/24 - By Therese Cooley, Upper School Art Teacher
11/10/24 - By Chip Crane, PhD
10/23/24 - By Sonmin Crane, Communications Manager with Roy Griffith, Headmaster

Categories

Archives