From the desk of the superintendent...
Dear NCS family,

Okay, so here's the thing: we don't talk about the monkeys. It's an unspoken understanding that we, as a global consortium of educators, have all collectively agreed to and held to for time out of mind: we just don't ask, and definitely don't answer, the questions about the monkeys. Whatever happened to the monkeys, they probably had it coming. All the same, we don't talk about it.

It's a time-honored tool used in teaching the 3's and 4's about how to count backwards and the fundamentals of subtraction. It's catchy. It's memorable. And, it's very, very violent.
You know the song. It starts with five little monkeys swinging in a tree. Apparently, not willing to leave well enough alone, these monkeys start teasing Mr. Alligator. Well, that never goes well. And, next thing you know, there's some snapping and whatnot, and we have four little monkeys swinging in that tree. But, again, thanks to the conspiratorial suppression of truth to which all educators have been party since the dawn of subtraction, the whereabouts of said fifth monkey have never been publicly revealed or even addressed.

Until this year. (The second week of school no less!) Little Billy (name changed to protect the monkeys) asks Mrs. Teacher of Four-Year-Olds, "Hey, what happened to the monkey?" Teacher gets nervous and responds: "Well, it's not in the tree." Says Billy, "Yes, I know, but where did the monkey go?" This goes round and round for a while until--finally, and sadly--Billy went home that afternoon with a fresh understanding of the world, of monkeys, and of alligators.

Dumb monkeys and cranky alligators aside, the truth is that students sometimes persist in asking the sorts of questions that we wish they wouldn't--the sorts of inquiries that deal with the sorts of issues that we, as parents and educators, wish were settled. Awkward questions. Hard questions. And, when this happens--it will happen--we don't have to be nervous. In Luke 7, we see John the Baptist sending two of his friends to Jesus with just such a question. They ask, "Are you the One who is to come, or should we expect someone else?” If anyone could have been undone by the question, it would have been Jesus. John was Jesus' cousin, grew up with Jesus, heard the stories about shepherds and wise men, and had, himself, seen the heavens open and heard the voice of God affirming Jesus. But, Jesus was not upset or undone by John's awkward question. Rather, lovingly, He sends John's friends back with encouragement: "Remember the things you've seen and heard". This is all that John needed. Simply, simple truth.

As we start the year, please recognize--and don't be discouraged--based on the culture we are surrounded by and the world we live in--our kids are going to ask questions. When they do, simply love them the way that Jesus does--the way that Jesus loved John--and gently remind them of the things that they have seen and the truths that they have heard. The Truth needs no defender. When Truth is complemented by Grace, it will win out. Every time.
Grateful for the opportunity to serve your family,

Geoff Brown
Superintendent
Northwest Christian School
(623)225-5573 (cell)
gbrown@ncsaz.org
This is why summer seemed so long... Almost as soon as the 2023/2024 school year began, chapels resumed. And, to the tune of nearly 700 elementary students singing and stomping their (student-led!) praises to the Lord, every faculty member on campus was refreshed and reminded of the gift that is children unreservedly and unabashedly worshipping their Heavenly Father.
Collection for The Sutton Project starts on October 16th! For well over a decade, The Sutton Project has been an integral part of Northwest Christian's spiritual formation program for students. The Sutton Project is a school-wide missions learning effort in which all Crusaders get involved in providing meals and gifts to precious students within in the Isaac School District.

Located in central Phoenix, according to sources, the Isaac School District is a 100% Title 1 school district that provides free or reduced lunch to all 7,500 of its students. The district is comprised of eleven schools in the Phoenix metro area. The Isaac community experiences high rates of crime, has limited access to health and social services, is located in a food desert, and has an above average poverty level. Residents in the area also face significant language barriers.

There are numerous ways to get involved for alumni, NCS Online, NCS Flex, and NCS on-the ground students and their families! Early Education and Elementary students donate food items, ranging from canned vegetables to cornbread mix to dried potatoes. Middle School and High School students are invited to sacrificially, generously contribute $20 to pay for turkey vouchers. For more information, please watch this video and consider following this link.
UPDATE, September 1, 2023: See below for more info. At this point, as mentioned below, our permits are in-hand and the permitted plans are under review with APS and the Arizona Office of the State Fire Marshal. We anticipate their approval no later than September 20th and look forward to moving direct by the end of the month.

Things are about to get interesting... After officially breaking ground on February 4th, all of the plans and permits for the new 12-room elementary classroom building have been approved by the City of Phoenix. In the next several weeks, we will begin the ten-month journey that will culminate in August 2024 with moving our youngest elementary-aged students to new rooms. As we have reported, a single donor's amazing generosity put the funding for the project over-the-top, enabling us to begin focusing on the next phases of the school's campus improvement plan. For more information on the "Build Here, Build There" plan, please follow this link. Recently, NCS Director of Operations Mike Waypa recorded an episode of the school's Kingdom Culture Conversations podcast, providing a description of how a year of construction could impact the campus...click here to listen to that episode. To learn more about the "Build Here, Build There" campus improvement campaign, please follow this link.
Strong start. On Friday, August 25th, the Crusader football season started in strong style with a stellar performance and a solid win against Walden Grove High School. Based on II Chronicles 15:7, the football team's spiritual emphasis theme for the 2023 season is simple: "Grit". After multiple state banners in Divisions II and III over the last decade, it's time to bring home the banner for Division IV! Will you help? Play your part by clicking here or on the image above!
At long last, "Checkmate". History was made on Friday, August 25th, when five Crusaders, led by coach Brett Irwin, competed for the first time in Northwest Christian history in the Arizona Interscholastic Association's statewide high school chess league. After several years of on-campus chess clubs and school-sponsored tournaments at both the elementary and middle school divisions, Northwest Christian reached the crucial, critical mass of student interest necessary to support a high school team. During the first outing, the Crusaders bested Cortez High School and each member of the team notched at least one "checkmate" on the way to the victory.
The Great Crusader Cook-Off Continues! On Friday, August 25th, during Northwest Christian's monthly professional development training, after kicking off in July, the Great Crusader Cook-Off continued with "Brownies" being the focus. Multiple faculty and staff submitted their best brownie recipes and the result was dozens of wonderful sweets for the teachers to enjoy. The surprise celebrity judge was Mr. Brown's own mother, Mary Brown--considered by many to be the finest brownie-baker on the planet. With a little help from the football team (pictured above), Mrs. Brown determined that there was a three-way tie for first place with each of the winners receiving a $500 cash prize. The champion bakers for the August Cook-Off were Alana Heater (high school), Margaret Petry (middle school), and Bridget Schumacher (elementary). To enjoy the fun, please click here or on either of the pictures above. (See previous Cook-Off's by clicking on the images below.)
Get ready for adventure! The Adventure Cru is Northwest Christian's outdoor adventure club for secondary students. Every couple of weeks--as part of the Crusader Clubs and Activities emails that arrive each Monday morning in students' inbox--students can sign-up to participate in low-cost, no-cost events that include: paintballing, rock climbing, archery, off-roading, shooting, kayaking, fishing, hiking, and so much more! Students and parents, be alert! This Monday, September 4th's edition of the email will include the schedule and sign-ups for Adventure Cru events for the balance of the semester!
Crusaders Got Talent LIVE, Season 6 on Thursday, October 19th! CGT grew out of the Covid-19 pandemic--an opportunity for gifted Crusaders to showcase their God-given talents during lockdown. But we were had such fun with it, the tradition continued! Now in its sixth "season", CGT is a Facebook Live event that will enable Kindergarten through 12th grade students (NCS Online, NCS Flex, and NCS on-the-ground) to submit pre-recorded talent videos, have them reviewed by judges who narrow them down to finalists, and then, ultimately, have those finalists see their videos played during the live online event. In real time, viewers can vote for their favorite entries using their cell phones and then winners--with big cash prizes--are announced live and "on the air". To get all the details, follow this link!
The 10th annual NXNW High School Film Festival is Friday, January 19th! With the top student film eligible to win $1,750 and a possible spot in the Phoenix Film Festival, the time is now to start working on your submissions to the NXNW Film Festival! This year's categories include animation, music video, short form narrative, and documentary. For more information on submissions, details on cash prizes, and more, visit: www.NXNWFilmFestival.com. NXNW also represents the premiere of the NCS Student Film for 2023/2024: "Test Takers". To learn more about NCS Student Films, please go to www.NCSFilms.com.
A spontaneous and unscheduled "missions trip". There's a quote from Father Greg Boyle that captures the heart and aspirations for the NCS Missions Learning program: "Missions and service is just the hallway that gets you to the grand ballroom. The grand ballroom is where we find kinship. It's here where we learn that God doesn’t want anything from us. God just wants us to be in that ballroom. When it stops at service, there’s a barrier—the service providers and the service recipients. But truth be told all of us are in need of healing. It is one of those things that join us together as a human family. " In that spirit, over the last decade, Northwest Christian's "mission trips" to the Kids Kingdom orphanage in Imuris, Sonora have become less and less "missions trips" and more and more "family reunions". There is increasingly less "us and them" as students here and there have literally grown up together. A recent example happened two weekends ago when a group of current Crusaders joined alumni to travel to the orphanage to participate in the quinceanera of one of the friends with whom they had grown up. Interested in joining one of the upcoming Northwest Christian missions trips during the 2023/2024 school year? NCS utilizes Managed Missions for registrations...visit this link for more information.
Impact Groups and Community Groups. A critical part of the NCS spiritual formation strategy for students is a long-standing "small group" initiative in which both faculty and student discipleship leaders facilitate "Impact Groups" in middle school and "Community Groups" in the high school. For many alumni, these groups are one of the most impactful strategies that the school engages. Pictured above, middle school students, divided into their Impact Groups, engage in a fun activity at the conclusion of a chapel.
Trusted Truth Transforms... It's the tagline for Northwest Christian School's foray into the realm of online education, the enrollment for which has blown up this summer. A project four years in the making, Northwest Christian School Online is not the typical online academy. Most online schools rebrand third-party digital curriculum. Instead, Northwest Christian School Online is wholly and organically developed and fully facilitated by Northwest Christian faculty. As well, the online experience is available at roughly half-the-price of other Christian online schools, a price that can be easily covered by an ESA for Arizona-based families. (To survey the price points of online Christian schools relative to NCS Online, please click here.) The most exciting aspect of Northwest Christian School Online is that some aspect of the program--Frameworks, NCS Plus, NCS Flex, and NCS Online--will ultimately impact the learning of every NCS student--whether that student is online or on-the-ground. To survey the different aspects of and opportunities within NCS Online, please follow this link. To learn more about NCS Flex specifically, please click the image below.
Continuing Education continues. As part of Professional Development in August, Northwest Christian enjoyed the return to campus of Dr. Roger Erdvig, the Senior Director of Biblical Worldview Education for Summit Ministries. The visit was the second such training in a month. With this visit, Erdvig spent a day observing in classrooms across the campus, monitoring for expressions of Biblical worldview. Then, on the following day, each teacher sat with their lesson plans for the forthcoming week and leaned about self-assessment of worldview implementation strategies.
RightNow Media is your chance to enjoy the Northwest Christian community -- in your living room!

All free of charge and via your phone, smart television, desktop computer, or tablet. RightNow Media is the Netflix of Bible studies and family-friendly movies and children's programming. It's also the home to a huge amount of video-based Northwest Christian content. On Northwest Christian School's RightNow Media page, available at this link, you can enjoy chapels, concerts, senior graduation, eighth grade promotion, Crusader's Got Talent, missions trips, and so much more.

The NCS RightNow Media page is also providing access to the NXNW 2021 student film, "Do-Gooders", as well as all of the other NXNW student films!

Registration takes just a few minutes and is absolutely free!