SCA

We are ending our first quarter this Friday. What an amazing time it has been already. It has been wonderful to see students working diligently in their classrooms, hear them reciting chants and songs, and admire the beautiful artwork they have created. We are so grateful we were able to start the school year off strong, together, and in-person! Our opening ceremony was an especially joy-filled celebration of our students, families, and staff. We have this wonderful video that was put together by Phoenix Chu of Liquid Luck Productions to help us remember it all. We are grateful for each one of you and look forward to a wonderful rest of the year together! We can’t wait to see all of the incredible things God does through the SCA community the rest of this year.

Help us kick off our first Prayer Warrior gathering. Prayers are powerful! What a privilege it is to be able to pray directly to the Creator of the Universe. Knowing this, we would love to have you join our team of prayer warriors. We will meet on Wednesdays immediately following morning assembly. Weather permitting, we’ll be outside. As it gets cooler, we will meet in the sanctuary. 

For those who cannot join us in person, we hope that you will set an alarm for 8:30 a.m. on Wednesdays and pray for the school, our community of families, and the staff. It would be incredible to have voices from all over (grandparents and loved ones included) lifting up Summit Classical Academy to our God and King!

The desire of Summit Classical Academy is to create and promote an environment of learning where dress is not a distraction to the educational process. The motivation for the policy has grown out of the following principles:

• Since our vision is to educate students in Christ, through Christ and for Christ, we need to acknowledge Him in all of our choices.
  • All human actions, including outward manifestations such as clothing, reveal and communicate the disposition of the heart at some level.
  • It is our desire to address these heart issues in one uniform policy rather than seeking to anticipate and curb the numerous manifestations of it that surface throughout a year with a looser dress code.
  • Clothing represents the vocational calling of a person, and inherent in the uniform policy is a desire to create an environment where undue attention is not drawn to specific students.
  • The neat appearance created by a uniform enhances a ready-to-learn atmosphere.
• Uniforms help engender a cohesive presentation of the students in our school
  • When our students are in uniform, it communicates, aesthetically, that they are part of the same team, working toward the same goals.
  • The student is part of a group identity that strives for excellence, and the code establishes a tradition toward that end.
• The uniform code should save parents money
  • The uniform code de-emphasizes the social impact of dress and helps focus the student on character and academic issues.
• The uniform code addresses security
  • On field trips, students in uniform aid the teachers in keeping track of everyone.
  • On the playground or in the school, teachers and staff can clearly identify students from outsiders.

Students are expected to be in uniform while on campus unless specified otherwise by the Head of School. The Head of School is responsible for the interpretation of the policy, and the enforcement of the policy is the responsibility of parents, Head of School, and staff.

What an incredible first week this has been! It has been wonderful to see students working diligently in their classrooms, hear them reciting chants and songs, and admire the beautiful artwork they have already created. We are grateful to start the school year strong, together, and in person!

Our opening ceremony on Wednesday was an especially joy-filled celebration of our students, families, and staff. We are grateful for each one of you and look forward to a wonderful year together!

Welcome to the 2020-2021 school year! We can’t wait to see all of the incredible things God does through the SCA community this year. 

Sarah holds her Bachelor of Arts degrees in both Secondary Education and Social Science from Benedictine College. Prior to joining SCA, Sarah taught middle school History and Theology at Frassati Catholic Academy. Her passion for classical education, methodology, and curriculum began in high school when she attended Ridgeview Classical School in Fort Collins. Studying in Florence, Italy, in college further deepened her love for history, culture, and the Western Judeo-Christian tradition.

Sarah and her husband were married in January of 2020. They enjoy hiking, camping, and exploring new places together. Their faith, family, and friends are most important to them.

Sarah shares her love for Christ naturally with her students. Her joy of learning is contagious as she teaches.

Sarah’s Philosophy of Education

Solid education combines classicalism, constructivism, and the philosophies of Thomas Aquinas. Classicalism incorporates Great Books curricula and the root beliefs of Western Civilization. This is taught in the Trivium of Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric at appropriate ages of development in a pupil’s life. Constructivism postulates that all learning spirals back on previous learning, so that one’s education builds on itself naturally. Lastly, following Thomas Aquinas, humans ought to study what is good, true, and beautiful to reach their end goal of knowing intimacy with God.

Although differing in cultural expression, all humans are ultimately created by God to know, love and serve Him. In school, students and teachers might know God in part by seeking what is true, noble, and beautiful in their studies. For this, curriculum should be truthful and worthwhile, be that practical or appreciative, and balance the humanities, hard sciences, reason, faith, art, creative expression, and physical exertion. Teachers might incorporate images of great art, beautiful poetry, or the wonders of nature to inspire their students to seek beauty and truth in their lives. By constructing new knowledge on past learning, lessons might be deeply experienced and integrated. Curriculum and assignments should follow the order of the Trivium so the level of difficulty is appropriate to the student’s development.

Learning also comes from example. Teachers should model Christlike behavior and teach moral lessons with love and logic to demonstrate the dignity, love, and respect given to each person and exemplified by Christ to his contemporaries. This must be done consistently, both within and without the classroom; positive relationship building with students and the community is key. Implicit curriculum should promote Christian philosophy and virtues, such as sharing and respect. Lastly, opportunities for service and social interaction will foster cooperation and conscientiousness so students and faculty can love God by loving each other. Combined, these practices will help students and teachers cultivate a relationship with God, an undying love of learning, virtue, and respect for others.

Patrick holds a Bachelors of Arts in Great Books from Bethlehem College and Seminary. He is currently pursuing a Masters of Divinity from Reformed Theological Seminary Online. 

Patrick married his college sweetheart in 2016. Originally from Colorado, they love living in the Boulder area and are excited to be part of discipling and training the next generation. Together they enjoy visiting coffee shops, reading great fiction, and the theater. They are members of Calvary Bible Evangelical Free Church in Boulder. 

Patrick is excited for the opportunity to be teaching and sharing the classical education he received at Bethlehem College, where the great books are studied in light of the Greatest Book for the sake of the Great Commission. 

Patrick’s Philosophy of Education

My philosophy of teaching focuses on the six habits of mind and heart that I learned while at Bethlehem College in Minneapolis. These habits are there to serve students as they progress out of the classroom and prepare them to become lifelong learners and achievers of great things. The mark of a truly educated person is not their ability to pass a test or regurgitate a prepared answer, but to be able to grasp another’s meaning, understand it thoroughly, and to answer it with the wisdom God has provided in His Word and His world.

The first habit of mind and heart is observing. Students must learn how to see for themselves what is before them, not just to be told what is before them. This first habit is the foundation for all critical thinking, as the student learns how to see for themselves what is in a text, or in creation, or the content of another’s speech. Then after learning to observe carefully, they can begin to see the world in the way in which God sees.

The second habit of mind and heart is understanding. This is the habit of being able to rearticulate the ideas of another in such a clear way that the author themselves would exclaim with delight over being so well understood. Without this habit, education becomes a twisting of other’s words to fit one’s own worldview. Understanding both Scripture and secular writers from all times and places exposes the flaws and faults of our own culture’s thinking and opens up students to the beautiful truth that God has set in His Word and world.

The third habit of mind and heart is evaluating. Since God is the source of absolute truth and He has revealed it to us first through the special revelation of His word and then through the general revelation of reason, students must be taught how to put the claims of authors against the truth of God. Only then can students learn how to rightly sift the true things that authors may be saying from the dross of cultural or philosophical falsity. This habit is crucial, for it allows students to honestly engage secular authors while still holding the Scriptures as the standard against which all claims about reality must be measured against.

The fourth habit of mind and heart is feeling rightly. Since God has ordained that people be feelers as well as thinkers, helping students pay attention to their emotional responses is a vital part of education. God is glorified by our right emotions of joy over Him and sorrow over sin. This habit of observing and understanding our emotions as we encounter reality helps students to see the way in which they are reacting to God’s Word and world.

The fifth habit of mind and heart is applying. The truths that are learned in the classroom must reshape the lives of students, otherwise the teaching has failed. Therefore, the process of students applying truth to their actual lives must be taught and followed through on, so that students can learn that the life of the mind and the life of the heart are intertwined.

The sixth and final habit of mind and heart is expressing. This the final step of a student who has passed through all the other stages of learning and can finally teach others the truths they have learned. This final habit is arguably one of the greatest goals of education, so that as students come to love God and their neighbor more, they can also help others to do the same.

These habits of mind and heart represent the core of my philosophy of teaching. Students come into contact with the greatest thinkers and ideas throughout history in the arena of classical education. They would have learned the habits to not just poke holes in the arguments of others, but apply the Golden rule to learning, understanding others as they wish to be understood.

The Good Soil survey was released early this year and shows significant differences for alumni of classical Christian Schools. ACCS students are more prepared academically, more traditional in their views, think more critically, and are more influential than those from other school backgrounds. During the 1990s, families in about 100 communities across the United States started classical Christian schools with the hope of offering an education that would assist parents in raising their children in the paideia of the Lord. The question almost thirty years later is: “To what extent have the goals of classical Christian education been realized?” To that end, the ACCS commissioned a study by the University of Notre Dame’s Sociology Department. David Goodwin, the president of ACCS talks about this study in this video, and you can view the full report here

Now we have an even newer study conducting the same survey, but using ACCS Alumni as a proxy for classical Christian education. The University of Notre Dame and ACCS teamed up to to produce “The School Effect”. The Summer 2020 issue of The Classical Difference is dedicated to describing the seven outcomes of “school.”

The Differences add up. In a survey of this type, the magnitude of the differences shown indicates that something is unique about ACCS graduates. Check out the full report here to learn more about this study.

Content taken from – The Classical Difference Vol. 6 No.2 | Special Issue 2020

We believe that it matters greatly who teaches our children. For that reason, the founders of SCA have handpicked Teresa Fraser to serve as Head of School. She is a leader of principled character and gracious love. Her heart for families results in beautiful relationships and a profound impact on the students she disciples. 

Teresa attended the University of Oklahoma for two years before transferring to Milligan College where she earned both her B.S. in Elementary Education and her Masters of Education. She has been a part of the founding of four different schools: Providence Academy in Johnson City, TN; Rocky Mountain Christian Academy in Niwot, CO; Flatirons Academy in Lafayette, CO; and Summit Classical Academy currently in Broomfield, CO. 

As Head of School, Teresa has worked in planning, preparing, and producing an excellent classical Christian education for students and their families. She is fully committed to sharing the grace and truth of Jesus with children, supporting parents, training and equipping teachers, and building a strong community of families. The heart of her profession has been the relationships she has built through the years with students, parents, staff and colleagues. Teresa believes her role is to come alongside parents as a partner in their children’s education. She is especially devoted to building a strong network of support for single parents, and she has a unique passion for involving fathers as much as mothers in their children’s school, because she has seen evidence through the years that students enjoy even more success with the mom and dad team behind them. 

Teresa believes that academics are only one facet in the educating and raising of children and that children need time to play and pursue their passions, gifts, and interests outside of the classroom. For this reason, she strongly believes in minimal homework so as not to intrude on other important activities such as family time, music, sports, art, friendships, and freeplay. 

Teresa and her husband Jim have been married since 1992. They have raised two remarkable children, their daughter Sadie and son Addison. Though Colorado is their beloved home, Teresa still faithfully cheers for her football teams, the Oklahoma Sooners and the Buffalo Bills, proving that she is no fair weather fan but loyal to the core.  

Vision

We aim to produce students who learn continually, listen intently, articulate precisely, love rightly, contend gracefully, and live purposefully for the glory of God and the good of others.

Mission

We will build community and serve our community by partnering with parents in the education of their children, striving to develop all aspects of the student’s potential. We will provide a classical Christian education, a peaceful and inspiring environment, and a high standard of expectations for our students, teachers, and leaders, all for the glory of God.

Core Values

What we will do every day:

• Speak truth, so that students know that they are gifts from God, image bearers of God, and warriors for God

What we want for our students:

• To think critically and deeply
• To articulate their thoughts precisely
• To struggle with ideas
• To be challenged every day
• To love God and love people
• To treat others’ thoughts and ideas with kindness and respect
• To create or build something with their hands
• To love and serve others by contributing their unique thoughts and personalities

What we want for our families:

• To know that parents are their children’s primary educators
• To know that the school is partnering with them in their children’s education
• To know that BOTH men and women are equally critical in their children’s education
• To be welcome into our doors every day
• To have abundant opportunities to be seen, to participate, and to be part of the school community
• To understand that the school is best when everyone’s God-given talents are utilized
• To continually find opportunities to serve our surrounding communities

Summit Classical Academy is thrilled to announce that we are now a part of King Soopers and City Market Community Rewards. The Kroger Co. Family of Stores is committed to helping the local neighborhoods grow and prosper. They seek to not only be a part of the community but to serve the community by supporting the unique organizations within it. Year after year, local schools, churches and other nonprofit organizations earn thousands of dollars through King Soopers Community Rewards. The mission of King Soopers aligns with SCA’s mission to build community and serve our community, and we are delighted to be a part of this amazing program.

Help us build our SCA community! We encourage you to link your loyalty card to Summit Classical Academy. Community Rewards is easy to use… all you have to do is shop at King Soopers and swipe your SooperCard (or enter Alt ID)! The more you shop with King Soopers or City Market, the more money Summit Classical Academy will earn!

Sign In or Create an Account to Enroll

For King Soopers Stores – go to http://www.kingsoopers.com

For City Market Stores – go to http://www.citymarket.com

New users will need to create an account, which requires some basic information, a valid email address and a loyalty card. Once logged into your King Soopers or City Market account, click on Valued Customer, go to My Account, then click on Community Rewards.  From there you can search for Summit Classical Academy either by name or organization number VE003.  Please note that the address associated with our account is our business office, not the physical location of the school.

We encourage your support to help us raise the funds we need for financial aid, school supplies, new teachers, curriculum, technology and so many other things that are necessary to run a school.

Please share this with your family and friends so they can help support SCA!

Thank you for your support!

Summit Classical Academy