One of the messages that has consistently been communicated this year is that we are aligning our curriculum and educational experience at Fortis Academy for academic excellence. One would think that such a commitment would be hailed unanimously by a school’s community, but not at Fortis… at least if such a statement is unqualified. Why? Because Fortis always has, and always will be committed first to the preeminence of Christ and to making disciples. As C.S. Lewis said in The Abolition of Man, “Education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make man a more clever devil.”
This highlights the fact that two institutions can be committed to the same goal of academic excellence, but the motivation can be extremely different. At Fortis, we are committed to academic excellence because we believe this glorifies Jesus Christ, and that it prepares people to live a satisfied life. Personally, I am very grateful to be a part of a community where everyone is working to help my daughters know and love Jesus Christ, and to have the intellectual, moral and spiritual qualities to impact our communities for His glory. It gives me great peace of mind to know that they are surrounded by other students and families that share our values and goals. One of the best parts of my job is that I regularly hear from parents how our teachers have touched their students’ lives with the love of Jesus and inspired them to walk with God in the midst of their academic instruction. Our goal is for these testimonies to continually increase as we train and equip our faculty and staff to fulfill the mission of our school.
Fortis will be unapologetic about pursuing academic excellence, but it will always be pursued in order to promote the preeminence of Jesus Christ in our lives, our families and in our communities.
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