I recently met a young man who has been involved in Christian classical education for a few years. One year his school decided not to attend a summer conference because it would not be cost effective. What happened, though, was that the teachers and leaders felt isolated.
He told me that summer without a conference took away his energy and vision. He felt like he had to attempt the impossible alone.
In effect, from that point on he was putting in time. He left Christian classical education for a while and the school that undercut morale by cutting costs found itself enduring the much greater expense of being without a key staff member.
I hope your school or home is able to support the morale and development of your faculty. If not, I don’t know how a school can succeed. Send them to a conference – local, regional, or national. Get them the training they need and that makes them feel valuable. Let them network with other like minded teachers.
Bless them.
That’s why conferences matter so much. We’re fighting a tough battle and those who are working the hardest need to know they aren’t alone. They need to know that others are asking the same basic questions: what is this thing we call classical education? How do we do it? How do we get people to sent their children to our schools?
And that’s why we have our annual CiRCE Institute conference.
