January 19th, 2018

Many private schools have enrollment for the next school year beginning in February or March preceding that start. This up-coming week is National School Choice Week. I recently came across an article by the President of the organization that sponsors that event, Andrew Campanella. His article, Time to focus on school choice, was in the South Strand News on January 11, 2018.

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Are you ready to make your school choice for your children?

I appreciate Andrew’s pointing out the many options available to parents here in the Grand Strand. On the public school branch of the education tree, we find regular neighborhood public schools, public magnet schools, and charter schools. On the non-public school branch of the education tree, we find private schools and homeschools. On the private school branch, we find for profit private schools and non-profit private schools. Many for-profit private schools are kindergarten/day care establishments. On the Non-profit private school branch are often found religious private schools, secular private schools, and niche private schools that address specific student conditions. On the homeschool branch, we find solo homeschooling parents and those who operate under a cooperative homeschool umbrella. With such a plethora of options, how do you choose which school meets the needs of your family. Having the right to make such a choice is a public policy issues that Andrew Campanella addressed. He rightly pointed out that more now than ever before parents are stepping up and making the choice for their children’s education.

Your Local Options

Our public school districts’ webpages clearly delineate the attributes of all schools operating under their umbrella and receiving funding from local, state and national governmental sources. These school do not charge tuition even though they do have heavy fundraising for supplemental programs that these governmental agencies have determined to not be priority.  It fells like that, at times, "no child left behind"  becomes every child left at lowered standards. Bullying of oth children and teachers has left many schools with a culture of aggression and not one that supports learning.

Many in our area have chosen to homeschool for one or more years. Some choose to go alone, others via online schools, and others through coops. However, other parents attempt this option but find that the discipline and level of work required is more than they care to do for the long term. At times, advanced courses seem overwhelming.

In the private for-profit school section in our area seems limited to higher education (i.e. post-high school). In any private school, parents or other benefactors pay tuition for the children’s education. Mr. Campanella indicated that there may be some state level programs of scholarships or tuition assistance for some children which would help offset tuition.

Non-profit private schools occupy many niches. Religious private schools may be sponsored by a single religious organizations (the Catholic school system is one such organized system sponsored by a single religion [see St. Andrews Catholic School] and the Chabad Jewish Academy] or a standalone one that takes a religious orientation (The Christian Academy of Myrtle Beach). We have many religious private schools in the area. These are particularly attractive to parents who want either religious orientations intertwined with secular academics or who wish to view secular academics through a religious lens.

A final category of which we have very few examples is the private secular school. The Renaissance Preparatory Academy fits into this category. We are non-profit project of the Social Good Fund with local control and design. The school is tuition and donation funded. It accepts no funds from any one religion or any level of government. You can see its features on the blog for the school. Its distinctive features include being an ABC or advancement by competence approach. This means a mastery approach with high expectations and strong accountability.  As students master the material for a grade in both math and language arts, they are promoted at the start of any term to the next grade level. Students are not held back so that all students receive the same low level/low expectation homogenous blah curriculum but are individually challenged to work hard and advance. Our culture is based on our honor code which is used for classroom behavior rules and also guides our faculty.

My recommendation is the one I founded with the goal of developing future business leaders and professionals, Renaissance Preparatory Academy.

So as you are faced with the choice for this next year, we hope that you will check out and choose Renaissance Preparatory Academy for a strong education that meets your child’s specific needs. We begin accepting enrollment for the 2018-2019 school year on February 1, 2018. Call the Headmaster at 854-529-0401!

Explore your choices. Make the right choice for your child. We hope that we are that choice for your family!

Janice Black, Founder and Chair of the School Board