It seems impossible that we are already at the end of February. This month has been a busy one as we have been involved in the process of Preregistration at the school. If you’ve been reading our updates, you’ll know that we have been wrestling with the direction we need to take regarding the growth of the school. Although this has been a dominant theme in the last month, I have had a secondary (actually for me, primary) concern regarding the vision of our Senior High (Preparatoria).
So... in part because of the demand and in keeping with our primary concern for the vision of the High School, we have decided to double the number of students that will enter our 7th grade. On the one hand, because of the demand, it appears that we won’t have a problem in meeting our enrollment goal of 50 Seventh Graders (2 groups of 25); on the other hand, accepting this number of students implies that we will need to construct more classroom facilities (soon!).
Although the commitment to additional construction seems a bit overwhelming, our concern is that of the focus of our High School. To this point we have more or less taken in all applicants; in part because we needed to increase enrollment in order to make the school self sufficient economically. However, in spite of the fact that the High School is known to have a strong academic focus and has acquired a solid reputation in the community, I think that we need to be more intentional about the discipleship and leadership development of our students.
Because we will only have space for 25 students in 10th Grade, by (eventually) having 50 students a year graduate from the Junior High, we will be able to be more selective of the students we accept in the High School. By being selective, our hope is that our students will be more aware of our vision for their development and, as such, more willing to submit to biblical discipline and our leadership. As I mentioned earlier... our teachers and staff have done a great job of getting the school “on the map” academically, but I don’t think that we should be satisfied with this. Basically, because of the need for Christian leadership in Latin America, I think we need to look at the High School as a 3 year intensive discipleship opportunity that emphasizes the idea of full time ministry as a vocation. Because of the history of protestantism in Latin America, this will be an “uphill battle”.
In conclusion, we ask that you would remember us in prayer.
- Pray for our staff... the commitment to discipleship is far more demanding than a commitment to “teach”.
- Pray for our school leadership... once we begin to be more selective in the High School, it is very possible that we could come under pressure from some of the authorities in the educational system.
- Pray for the continued development of our physical plant and the academic development of our staff... in other words, additional funding and volunteer work teams.
