Building on history: A ‘classical education for modern times’

By Brenna Wiegand

Nestled away up in the hills above Scotts Mills is the historic Maple Grove Schoolhouse, open from 1929-2010; from 1888 to 1928 it occupied another building up the hill.

A going concern back when timber money stayed local, teachers and parents fought the school’s unification with Molalla River School District in 1993 and then its closure in 2010 due to budget cuts. However, this opened the door for a band of parents and teachers looking to create a new, tuition-free charter school.

Renaissance Public Academy just completed its third year, an “Outstanding” report card from Oregon Department of Education already under its belt. Sixty-five of RPA’s 105 students achieved Honor Roll or High Honor Roll at the end of this year’s second trimester – that’s 62 percent.

“We got in just under the wire,” said Jennifer Coffman, Director of Student Development. “With funding cuts from the state no new charter schools are being funded; ours was one of the last.”

Behind the front desk at RPA is Raleen Hockenberry, familiar to area residents as the enthusiastic Silverton Little League President from 1991-2001 – one that made things happen. She and husband Darryl helped grow the program from 125 boys and girls to more than 600 during that decade, implementing Little League’s emphasis on no one being turned away from the program for any reason, including money.

They formed an adaptive program for those with various challenges and in 2006 Hockenberry was honored as Little League Challenger Division Volunteer of the Year and gifted a trip to the Little League Baseball World Series in Pennsylvania.

The Hockenberrys live in Scotts Mills, where she’s been captain of the Neighborhood Watch Program for 14 years and a teacher’s aide at the school.

Now she finds herself administrative assistant at RPA, asked to apply by Silverton resident Randal Brown who’d been appointed headmaster.

“I was attracted to being part of a young school designed with a different slant toward the education and development of young people,” she said. “A little different than large programs like Little League, this gives me the opportunity to daily be more hands-on and face-to-face with a lot of youth.”

Students hail from as far away as North Portland to avail themselves of the small student body and Classical education.

Jennifer Rogers of Silverton, whose 14-year-old son Brock joined this year, appreciates the school’s high standards “that include how the kids treat one another.”

“I homeschooled for seven years … it was kind of scary,” her son Brock said, “but I made some friends pretty quickly and it’s a nice school.

“I’m not crazy about the dress code, though,” he added. “I’d like to wear jeans and a T-shirt, but this way I guess you don’t think about what you look like so much.”

Cole De Risio, also a sophomore, has attended public and private schools and is part of the Canby swim team.

“People try not to deliberately ask you, but they’re asking you at the same time,” De Risio said. “I just tell them we learn Latin and Western Civilization so we go back all the way back to ancient Greece and work our way up to the Roman Empire. In Western Civ II we pick up after the fall of Rome all the way up to the Ottoman Empire.

“I enjoy the atmosphere and the studies,” De Risio said. “Rather than being pushed through if you somewhat know it, up here you have to master it.”

“We believe in ability grouping,” said Coffman. “Students are tested and placed when they come in. Then we observe for a few weeks and retest so they can move up or down.

Coffman said her staff is young – median age in the late 20s – and vivacious.

“They will take time out of their day to make sure you get it,” student Hunter Lewis said. “I mean, Latin was really complicated sometimes, so Ms. Porter would take time out of her lunchtime and come back down here to explain it.”

“I was insanely shy the first day; like, it was bad,” said Jared Johnson. “But I’m really happy – it’s a smaller school and you’re friends with everybody.”

“The teachers expect a lot, but it’s only because they know that you’re really capable of doing something,” said Leah Andrews, 16, who schooled online prior to joining RPA this year.

The majority of the school’s special events such as dances involve the whole family. To facilitate home discussions, the school offers families copies of books their kids read – Fahrenheit 451, Cyrano de Bergerac, The Iliad.

“We think society undervalues the family so we try to involve them as much as possible,” said Coffman, who considers doing so an important part of the learning process.

“They should know how to listen to an opposing point of view respectfully, be able to counter the arguments that come their way and, based on that conversation, either change their mind about what they believe – or become more solidified in their beliefs and know why.”

“Wherever possible we use original sources for history, so when we study the Constitution, we’re reading the Constitution,” she said. “We try to bring it to life – ‘Why would they have worded it this way? What was going on that caused them to become traitors to the king and fight for this new nation?’”

She’s often asked why, from fifth grade, all the students learn Latin.

“English is more than 50 percent Latin; all the romance languages are based in Latin,” Coffman said. “It teaches students how to decode and learn a language and develops the logic to make them better speakers and writers. If you look at fields like medicine and science it’s all Latin roots wherever you look.”

Despite its denim deficit, RPA is growing and hopes to find a larger facility – hopefully not one at snowline.