On Monday March 16, at 10am, JRHS went to a 100% remote learning environment due to the Covid 19 Crisis. On the weekend of March 14 and 15, JRHS Faculty members met and experimented with various methods that would best support the continued delivery of the JRHS program of study to our families.
These are trying times indeed, and JRHS is in the middle of a defining moment. With God’s help and blessing, we are going to not just survive, but we are going to thrive through and beyond this time, and come out the other side a stronger, better school.
I’m reminded of Esther’s story, when cousin Mordechai challenged her, “And who knows, maybe you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?” I’m realizing this is an “Esther” moment for us – we are ready to face this time!
The Mission of JRHS is to be a Christian Community of Students and Faculty, pursuing Wisdom, Knowledge and Understanding, and is committed to raising this generation of youth to be effective leaders for Jesus Christ. The Coronavirus Pandemic of 2020 is surely making it difficult for us to deliver our mission, and we are doing this completely different than ever before.
We have an Expected Student Outcome called Personal and Professional Development, and in this ESO we have this missional objective:
“Exhibit excellence, perseverance through obstacles, grit and resilience”. This reminds me that we never know what God is going to ask us to do, but we need to be ready to be faithful and obedient.
Students are not here this week at our lovely campus, but there is great life-forming learning going on all over the area, each student from their home. Let me tell you about some of the awesome things the Faculty is doing this week:
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A key decision we made is that we were going to stick to the regular class schedule to the extent we could, and therefore, each student is dressed and ready for class, just like when they come to campus. We have somewhat quickly and adeptly harnessed the potential in Zoom and Google Classroom; our teachers are holding full and meaningful classes with students present, yet from their homes.
Yesterday, I popped into a class led by our Bible teacher, Matt Hannan, and to coincide with our UTT unit, the students were screen sharing articles they had researched about the current world events, and under MH’s capable leadership, they were analyzing the world view of the articles
Humanities teacher Jacob Samuelson is working through great literature with his students, utilizing doc drops and chat rooms.
ESL teacher Christopher Knecht is caring for our international students using Zoom, meeting with them individually and corporately.
Teachers have set office hours for tutoring, most noticeably in math. I’ve seen screen shares, on screen demonstrations, and even teachers using the whiteboard to show problems.
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I’m going to conclude with this – I want to invite you to Chapel! Last week we pulled off the first ever – Virtual Chapel, and we are going to do it again every Friday until we get the blessing to meet again in real-time community. We’d love to see some parents, alumni, financial partners, prospective families, and friends, join JRHS in chapel via Zoom, Friday mornings, 8am. If you would like to join, give me a call at 483-5664 ,or send me an email at jphilbrick@jrhs.org.
See you in Chapel!