Cougar Pause: Grading Scale, Lakeland Christian Academy Style
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Carmen Flores-
This week we have asked guidance counselor Carmen Flores to describe LCA’s perspective on their grading scale. A – Academics. Are Important, but not all-important. From 7th to 12th grades, change happens at an incredible rate. We partner with parents to shepherd students through these changes and toward God’s best for them. Personal relationships with teachers and accountability between school, student and home help us to help students become academically competent, spiritually mature and socially responsible. B – Being Faithful. We seek to meet students’ academic needs wherever they may fall on a grading scale. Limited staff and funding may sometimes threaten to derail our efforts, but our professional teachers and staff invest time and energy into knowing each student and helping them to be successful. Resource Time is an all-school study hall when all teachers are available for make-up work, questions or personalized help. Success Management RT (SMART) is designed for students with organizational challenges and includes a high level of accountability for assignments and materials. C – Create-A-Course. We offer a Create-A-Course option for juniors and seniors. This is a cooperative education program where students find a mentor in their area of interest and design a curriculum with the mentor. The mentor assesses their progress and reports their grades back to the guidance department. Over the years, we have had CACs designed in dentistry (Dr. Scripture), photography (Marah Grant), youth ministry (Pleasant View Bible Church and First United Methodist of North Webster), music (John Finken), cosmetology (Think Young), business management (Bibles and Books), auto repair (Monteith Tire) and many others. This year, a senior has become a licensed pharmacy tech and is an intern at Zale’s Drugstore. D – Dual Credit. Juniors and seniors have access to Grace College classes for $100 per credit hour (on Grace campus) or $25 per credit hour (for courses we offer on our campus). We currently offer two college courses on our campus. Because of a special arrangement with Grace, our students are not limited to the “Jump Start” class list. LCA students are permitted to take any course in Grace’s catalog for which they meet the prerequisites. We feel that this real-life college work is superior to “honors” or Advanced Placement courses because it is accredited and assured, transferable college credit and not dependent on passing a standardized AP test. The college credit opportunities at LCA will be expanding even further in the near future. The class of 2014 graduated with an average of eight college credits and one student transferred a high of 18 college credits. F – Fresh Start. We all need one from time to time. All of us – students and staff alike – are lifelong learners academically and spiritually. What a privilege to educate the whole person! “Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.” Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 3:12-14
