Reaping the benefits of a faith-based education

By Mary Beth Almond
C & G Staff Writer

» Click on image to view full size « Southfield Christian High School students pray during class. Southfield Christian High School students pray during class.

One of the most important decisions parents can make is deciding where to enroll their child in school. When exploring all the educational options, local religious school leaders say parents should keep one specific characteristic in mind: compatibility with family beliefs and lifestyle.

One of the major benefits of a faith-based education, according to Gregory Simon, dean of admissions and diversity for Notre Dame Preparatory School, is that the ethics and morals talked about at home and in church are reinforced in the religious school classroom.

“For most families, faith is an important part of the lessons they teach in their homes, and we’re able to reinforce that for families that follow our particular faith, so it’s about a partnership with families,” he said.

Simon said the world throws a lot of stuff at kids, so many parents like the idea of having their children’s faith reinforced by the school that they’ve chosen for them.

“In a democracy, in a pluralistic society like ours, public schools really can’t do that because they are trying to provide an academic education for a wide variety, a more broad variety, of perspectives — faith perspectives, worldviews, et cetera. From the value standpoint, we’re a little bit more narrowed, so it allows us to provide that service to our families, and that’s a big part of why they choose us,” he said.

Margie Baldwin, superintendent of Southfield Christian School, said the fact that faith-based schools offer a continuation of values in the classroom is a major draw for many parents.

“If you have a faith-based mindset, we endorse and support that here in the school. It’s not just that our students go to chapel, or that they have a Bible class every day, but the biblical integration is incorporated into everything we teach. We teach from a biblical worldview, so what you get is a continuation of your values, of your beliefs, of your faith, and for a lot of faith-based people that is hugely important,” she said.

Another advantage, Simon said, is that religious schools help students develop a strong set of academic skills — such as higher-order thinking, critical thinking, citizenship and leadership — which they are then taught to use to help others and “make the world a better place.”

“Academics and athletics and leadership and all of those skills aren’t separated out from faith; those are part of the development of that whole person and that whole palette of talents. The driving force, or motivation, behind it is that once you develop those, they’re not just yours. They are on loan to you, and you should use those skills to benefit other people. Families like the idea of that being sort of the anchor, that being the core message. They know that their faith and that perspective of development of gifts, service, generosity and obligation to other people is the core message behind these academic skills,” he said.

Notre Dame is a private Catholic co-educational college-preparatory school, for grades pre-K through 12, with campuses in Pontiac and Waterford. For more information, visit www.ndpma.org.

Southfield Christian School is a coeducational, pre-K through 12 Christian, college-preparatory school established as a ministry of the Highland Park Baptist Church of Southfield. For more information, visit www.southfieldchristian.org.
 

You can reach C & G Staff Writer Mary Beth Almond at malmond@candgnews.com or at (586)498-1060.