Posted on 07/04/2024 10:25:34 PM PDT by Morgana
Northside Christian Academy, a private Christian school founded in 1961 and operated as a ministry of North Side Baptist Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, is no longer in operation due to low enrollment following a brawl at a high school basketball game with a rival team in January.
Former parents and staff at the school revealed that the brawl at the basketball game was simply one of a long list of challenges that led to the school announcing in May that it was closing the K-12 school, according to The Charlotte Observer.
“Unfortunately due to, but not limited to, low re-enrollment and the viability and sustainability of the ministry, we determined that it was necessary to close,” the school said in a May 6 email to parents of the school, known for its sports teams called the Knights.
Keizah Shouse, whose son attended high school at Northside for the last two years, told The Charlotte Observer that in January, a parent from an opposing team punched a player and caused a brawl to break out. Leadership at Northside Christian Academy responded by expelling the player, ending the season for the basketball team.
That move sparked an exodus of students as parents began removing their children from the school, where tuition runs about $9,850 to $11,650, annually. In North Carolina, the state’s Education Assistance Authority provides approximately $7,000 per student to families who want to send their child to a private school instead of a public one, regardless of income.
Parents told the Observer that after the brawl, Northside Pastor Michael Landrum decided to end the basketball team’s season without providing a “real explanation.”
Edward Cooke, the school’s most recent basketball coach, told the Observer that despite the team's success, the administration was generally hostile to the athletes.
“The boys would get reprimanded for little things,” Cooke told the publication. “It didn’t feel like we were part of the school.”
He further noted that many of the just under 300 students had started attending because of him. Cooke said after the basketball season was cut short earlier this year, he chose to leave and many of the students left with him.
“A lot of the kids were at that school because of me, so I brought in a lot of kids,” Cooke explained. “I had 30 kids I was planning to bring into the school.”
Teachers reportedly told parents that only about 60 students had re-enrolled for the 2024-25 school year.
Prior to the brawl that sparked the exodus of students, former parents and teachers said they had been concerned about general management at the school.
According to Cooke, the boys’ basketball team did not get rings after winning the state championship last year.
“They said they didn’t have the money and didn’t want to raise the money to pay for them,” Cooke recalled. “We also played half the season with no heat in the gym.”
Felisha Wall, whose son was in eighth grade at Northside this year, said she was concerned about what the school was doing with the fees it collected.
“There was no air or heat in the school, but there was in the church,” she told the Observer. “I was wondering where our money was going.”
Landrum told the publication that the school was operated within the church’s budget which isn’t open to public scrutiny despite benefiting from the use of public funds.
“Northside Baptist Church ministries, including Northside Christian Academy and daycare all operate under one ministry budget approved annually by Northside members,” he said, declining to answer further questions.
This seems common in Dem run cities and organizations. Many of these are run by non-blacks.
Wrong NCA...
Same thing happened at my children’s school. The teacher/ basketball coach convinced the school administration to give scholarships to deserving city students, who just happened to be all boys of high school age who were good at basketball. It was all downhill after that. These new students refused to conform to the dress code, never did homework, and brought a new vocabulary to the school. They were disruptive to say the least. My son graduated that year, and I told the headmaster my daughter was not returning in the fall. Other parents did the same. After a long and respectable existence, the school closed the following year. That is the reason I am not a fan of school vouchers. One never fully appreciates what they get for free.
I would not bet against you.
I hear ya. It’s a Democrat more than anything else.
A consequence of sports worship. Common at at both religious (hesitate to say “Christian”) and secular schools in the south.
“That is the reason I am not a fan of school vouchers. One never fully appreciates what they get for free.”
People just don’t seem to understand that school choice will not be only for white students. The mothers of the troublesome black students, who don’t really give a crap about their children’s education, will see this as another entitlement. The troublesome black students will end up at the schools that parents are now paying big money to get away from them. I don’t think school choice is not going to be what people think it’s going to be.
My nephew went to a school with similar issues in southwest Louisiana. Once it became about athletics and “recruiting” athletes into the school.................then the problems came.
Christian schools with outstanding records often recruit ringer players from the community. It is an attempt to influence sometimes troubled youths to become better citizens and is a legitimate ministry, IMHO. However, it often doesn’t work out.
I think the reason it doesn’t often work out is because we are trying to change the person on the outside, hoping that those changes seep inside of him and recrate him on the inside.
This is part of the reason to stick with scholastics, you have to change people on the inside in order to change them on the outside.
My Christian college is closing its doors this week forever after almost 100 years.
It has slowly slipped into modernism over the last couple of decades, but supposedly the main reason is financial issues. (My cousin said Title IX has been a big factor.)
Holy cow. I actually placed a business advertisement in their campus directory decades ago. I know nothing about this situation, but it’s a big campus.
I recently had a conversation with a person who knew a coach at a Christian school. This coach was a really good guy and tried to be a good male role model for kids raised by a single mom. He served as coach for 18 years. The gist of the conversation was that most of these young me fail when graduating and out on their own.
We are in deep need of mentors, men that young men can talk to for guidance. That’s a good church ministry.
My comment was not meant to reflect the black community in general, but the black leadership that seems to take control and fail the kids badly.
The US spends more on education than everywhere else in the world, but where black kids go to school where the school has a black leadership, the kids fail badly. In Republican states, they do much better. Well enough to go to college in many cases.
It just makes me sad and cynical, but it was not meant to disparage blacks in general.
Understood.
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