Measuring Success

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked him. Mark 10:51

I had the experience recently of answering a question for an enquiring parent who asked me about the means by which we evaluate our students and their success.  I shared the pattern of assessments teachers use in their classrooms, described the concept of our recently adopted Learning Skills Rubric distributed three times annually, and our locally developed report cards which chronicle learning, social and personal development, and personal study skills.

They were impressed, but the question still came back re-phrased as “For my son, when do you know you have been successful as a Christian school?” Realizing that we were talking about a different, more life-long kind of measure of success, I directed them to our graduate profile that our board approved last year. It names characteristics of a graduate as they relate to God, others and self. You can find it on our webstite here: www.londonchristian.ca/graduate-profile.php

The first two of nine descriptions of our goals for graduates read as follows:

1. Begins to develop a deeper commitment to love and serve Jesus Christ. We want our students to follow Jesus Christ in all situations, conversations, and experiences. We want to work with Christian homes and Christian churches to present a consistent message that God is the ruler over all the earth.

2. Discovers and experiences the joys and wonders of God’s world. We want our students to study the creation in a way that gives them excitement for the way in which God has created our world.

Jesus asked Bartimaeus in the above text what he wanted him to do for him. He asked for sight, which Jesus immediately granted him by acknowledging the faith with which he asked. In faith, our prayerful petition is that God will work in the hearts and minds of our students, gifts from God that they are, in such a way that they become a faithful presence wherever they are planted, and are unending in their desire to advance God’s kingdom. Now that is success!