At Faith Christian Academy, our secondary is a place where students are given the freedom to ask, “Why?” at the same time they are being equipped to discover the answers they are seeking. Secondary students are introduced and reintroduced to the Great Books of the ages. They are engaged in Socratic dialogue, all the while being pointed to the God of the universe. Conversations around great literature or Great Ideas that begin in the classroom, often continue after the bell rings.
Graduation Requirements
Our Departments
Bible
The Bible Department seeks to impart a love of the true person and work of Christ and to form a rich knowledge of God through a meditative study of His Word. The goal of our instruction is to cultivate a genuine love of God and others issuing from a pure heart, good conscience, and a sincere faith.
Humanities
The Humanities Department includes a study in history, philosophy, literature, writing, and the arts considering God’s Word. We seek to lead students into a conversation and deeper understanding of the social, religious, and cultural aspects which have informed humanity’s examination of human nature, human society, and man’s relationship to God as it is expressed in narrative and cultural practice while providing opportunities for students to examine themselves in light of Truth found.
We seek to provide tools and opportunities for students to engage in The Great Conversation, appreciate the English language, grow in their recognition and appreciation of beauty, and mature in their engagement with literature and language. Our literature choices and reading selections relate to what T. S. Eliot described as “the permanent things” – to the splendor and tragedy of the human condition, to constant moral insights, to the spectacle of human history, to love of community and country, and to the achievements of right reason, conferring upon the rising generation a sense of what it is to be fully human, and a knowledge of what great men and women of imagination have imparted to Western civilization over the centuries.
Upon leaving FCA, it is our hope that our students go into the world as good men writing and speaking well out of the abundance of a good heart.
Science
The Secondary Science Department includes studies in physical and general science, biology, chemistry, physics, anatomy, and physiology. Through exploration and discovery, we seek to create wonder and appreciation while inspiring students to embrace stewardship of God’s creation. We endeavor to lead our students through inquiry and hands-on learning and to engage them in discovering the order that is hidden within Creation’s complex beauty. We are committed to teaching the scientific method, discussing the implications of man’s discoveries, and exploring the contributions of past and present scientists, naturists, and anatomists.
We aim to graduate students that are informed, inquisitive investigators who are able to view the beauty of the world with a balanced approach to scientific advancement and Christian charity.
Math
Logic and Rhetoric
Our logic class introduces our eighth-grade students to traditional logic in preparation for more advanced studies in the liberal arts, especially rhetoric. The class focuses on our natural ability to desire and discover truth and to extend the material object of these truths to questions of ultimate concern.
Our students are equipped with fundamental tools of reasoning, emphasizing the analysis of arguments (formal, informal, categorical, and propositional) for validity. Students learn to define terms, explain relationships between statements, and identify both formal and informal fallacies as they learn to ask rigorous intellectual questions, especially of themselves.
Our intent is to foster the idea that logic is an expression of God’s unchanging character.
Aristotle describes rhetoric as, “The faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.” (Aristotle, Rhetoric, 1:4:1359). Rhetoric is the art of communicating thought from one mind to another. It’s the adaptation of language to circumstance and involves an appeal to character, emotion, and reason. It can be summed up by the phrase “Good men speaking well.” Rhetoric I is the first year of a student’s capstone of FCA’s liberal arts education. Rhetoric I and II work together to give students the tools to express truth effectively as students morph writing skills to fit speaking. Instruction in the five canons of rhetoric and three modes of persuasion enables students to present excellent speeches. Rhetoric I focuses on the canon of invention and arrangement with particular emphasis on sound proofs, good character, and effective use of emotion.
Rhetoric II students present both prepared and impromptu speeches with a focus on arrangement of arguments in a persuasive manner with particular attention on delivery.
Languages
- Latin I, II
- Spanish I, II
- Greek I, II
Fine Arts
Music is inherently part of the order of the created universe. As creatures made in God’s image, we have a natural inclination to be drawn to harmonic and rhythmic structure. At FCA, we seek to rightly order our students’ affections by cultivating their natural love of music.
Through our grammar school instruction, students experience music’s mystery firsthand by singing, dancing, playing instruments, listening, and performing. Students also learn to read and write musical notation.
At the secondary level, students have the opportunity to further develop and refine these skills through vocal and instrumental performing ensembles. Students are equipped to participate in and appreciate our robust Western musical tradition, including folk and church music. These provide the primary sources of our repertoire. Their timelessness provides opportunity for exploring the beauty, truth, and goodness of music as an ordered element of creation.
- Choir
- Women’s Choir
- Orchestra
- Middle School Art
- Secondary Studio Art
Electives
- Photojournalism
- Reader’s Theater
- Theater