Covenant Christian Academy to open this fall as a pilot
by Jim Boyle
Editor
Borrowing the best parts of a full-time private Christian school experience and that of homeschooling, a group of people in Elk River have come together to open Covenant Christian Academy.
The school will initially offer classes to children entering kindergarten through third grade this fall in Elk River with plans to add at least an additional grade level every year until the program is K-12.
The hybrid school will be a mix of classroom learning run out of Gateway Church off Highway 10 in western Elk River and home-schooling. The school and church have forged a partnership to make it happen.
The goal will be to provide an exceptional education that partners with parents to build foundations for lifelong followers of Jesus and curious learners.
“It’s not a branch of Gateway,” said Katie Kocinski, the school’s director of administration. “It’s separate branches working parallel to each other.”
Gateway senior pastor Jeff Smith says it gives the church and the school an ability to have a shared vision and shared goals as well as the advantages that come from separation.
“We’re trying to be thoughtful, intentional and creative in how we build the model,” Smith said.
Kocinski said one of the goals they have is to build a school that is welcoming to the entire community and not just people from one particular church.
“I think because we’re operating as a separate organization, we’re able to make our own decisions that won’t be dictated by a church board,” she said. “I think a lot of Christian schools follow that model.”
The hope and vision for Covenant Christian Academy is that biblical truth will be integrated across all subject areas to highlight the fingerprints of God in everything. Organizers says it won’t be like some Christian schools that have a Bible course but do not weave Chistian education in its other courses.
“I have seen a lot and have had some friends who that have participated in this type of school, and it’s a Christian school by name and the one class for the child.
“And then everything else generally remains the same as what you would have at a different place,” Smith said. “I think the goal is to raise up kids that are well-formed as followers of Jesus for the age that they are at. Students will be well-educated, with a high degree of excellence, but also a good understanding of their place in the story that God is writing.”
The seed for Covenant
The seed for Covenant Christian Academy in Elk River came long before the idea of a school sprouted. It was a broader conversation over breakfast that happened between Smith and Chris Carlson, the founder of Sportech, after he had sold the business in the fall of 2019
“Our family was at a pivotal point in thinking about what’s next, and really our legacy and what we can do to maximize the impact in the community and glorify God,” Carlson said. “We felt like if there was a way for us to contribute to private Christian education in the community we thought that would be great. We believe there’s a need here and there’s been a void for awhile.”
Smith called it a brief conversation, and one that nothing came of it at the time.
Carlson, however, a visionary who likes to think big, continued weighing how a group could build a K-12 facility, complete with athletics program on Day 1 and competitive by Year 3.
“That’s how I think,” he said. “I had began to realize that wasn’t going to happen.”
Fast forward a couple of years, and the subject came up again — this time with a little more form and function to it. The dream and vision got some legs when Carlson attended a Turning Point USA conference. The nonprofit founded in 2012 by Charlie Kirk had added an academic division called Turning Point Academy to its organization.
“Man, did that open our eyes,” he said. “Hey, we can do this. We will have to start a little smaller and grow incrementally. That was really the catalyst.”
According to Turning Point Academy’s website, the division was added not so much to create a school but rather a movement to reclaim education for children. Carlson confirmed that Turning Point Academy is very clear that there are a lot of ways to do this and they don’t suggest you have to do it one particular way.
“It’s just a playbook,” Carlson said. “To be honest I don’t know if we would be opening this fall if it wasn’t for them.”
The organization’s work provided a pathway for the folks in Elk River to start small with a long-range goal of developing a K-12 program. Gateway has room for a K-3 program, but beyond that would necessitate building plan or expansion plans.
The hybrid will include three classroom days a week and two at-home learning days, which not only lowers the cost of the private education option but also ramps up the parental and family component to learning.
“Right, wrong or otherwise, I don’t perceive that there’s a whole lot of creativity in the way that kids are educated in the world today,” Smith said. “So I think that this creates a really unique, blended, holistic model of education that does include a faith component, which is important, does include the family component, which is super important, but also strives for excellence.”
Kocinski says there will be a really intentional partnership between parents and the learning that happens at home and the learning that’s happening in the classroom.
“A lot of people are in agreement that the role of the parent in education is so essential. But a lot of times, with the five-daily model, you lose the ability of the parent to be with your kids enough to be a key player in that,” Kocinski said. “This hybrid model should set up families and the school for some really deep, rich learning that happens in both places.
“To facilitate that, parents will be given the week’s plan for what they would be doing at home for at-home learning, and that’s created by the classroom teacher. So it’s like a supplemental extension to what’s happening here at the school.”
Enrollment for Covenant Christian Academy started this month.
An informational meeting was held April 29. About 60-70 people attended. Another will be held at 6:30 p.m. on May 20 at Gateway Church.
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