Breaking for Summer, But What An Amazing Year

As the parent of a 2022 graduate of LCS, I can say that this year was a blur… It feels like it was many different years all packed into one. And now, it is over.

We began the fall of 2021 navigating the constantly changing federal mandates and provincial health orders related to the COVID-19 pandemic. When the Omicron variant spread rapidly through our school and the government moved to a locally-managed response in January, and then lifted the orders completely in March, everything that we had once included as part of our rhythms and routines as a school community came roaring back to life after being dormant for almost three years. Many of the teachers, administrators and staff who work at LCS have arrived at June more tired than what would likely have been their experience in previous years.

Despite all the challenges of the past year, the LCS Board, the senior leadership team and the staff have continued to move the school forward in the direction of continuous incremental improvements and planning for the future. In the past school year we formalized our strategic plan and continued our success in collaborating with parents to make this a better school for all of the families God brings to us and calls us to care for and educate.

TODAY, TOMORROW, TOGETHER

In 2021-2022 we implemented a wide range of initiatives aimed at improving our school, ensuring our programming is sustainable and we are well positioned to grow with the changes impacting the community of Langley.

• The first phase of our Three-Phase Campus Expansion Plan passed with society approval (100%) and we expect to begin site excavation in early July.
• Our community generously supported the Impact and Innovation Fund and we raised $123,000 at the Golf Tournament and $224,000 at the Dinner & Auction. Our total net of fund raising efforts since 2020 has been over $1,000,000. These efforts have resulted in substantive capital improvements this year. We have also greatly increased access to financial aid with the aim of making Christian education more accessible to more families in our community.
• Teacher and EA salaries were increased for the third year in a row, bringing our compensation package for essential staff to near equal with local public districts.
• We launched a new website to better communicate who we are as a school and how we are impacting our community. Our practices, policies and guidelines in all areas of our school operations – such as HR, student policies and finances – are fully transparent to our existing families and employees, and our future families and employees.
• Diverse ability, experienced, high capacity administrative leadership teams have been established to guide each campus and create K-12 collaboration toward meeting our goals. Joyce Wang (Director of Learning Services) and Kevin Mirchandani (Director of Instruction) made impactful contributions in their new leadership roles. David Jackson, Anita Wood, Patrick Lee and Lori Carpenter each successfully completed their first year under extraordinary circumstances and provided outstanding leadership. We have added diverse and highly skilled teaching and support faculty to our exceptional, dedicated, long-serving staff.
• We celebrated the contributions of retiring board members Danielle Stevenson and Leanne DeWitt, and welcome three new board members who are passionately invested in the future of LCS, two of whom are the first ever LCS alumnus to serve on the board.
• We restructured our high school schedule, programming and staffing model for 2021-22 and 2022-23 to provide better services, support and programs for students. The Lightning Life Department and addition of the House Director roles were a key component of this plan moving forward.
• We answered the question: What is distinctive about an LCS education? … And we completed a massive effort to create a revised K-12 Bible curriculum that captures our new Learner Profile. We launched a new LCS Talks podcast series to discuss and communicate our positions on important educational issues.
• We have established a strong relationship of reciprocal mentorship and professional development with the Faculty of Education at TWU.
• We launched our new Parent Advisory Committee to provide connection, increase volunteerism, parent engagement and dialogue about the issues and ideas the inspire us.
• We completed and ratified a new Constitution & Bylaws, and created, improved or clarified a number of policies that define who we are as a teaching and learning community. Our board governance model, Admissions process, society membership process, hiring policy and curriculum policy outline how we are distinctive compared to other schooling options in the community.
• We added a new Before and After School Care program that we will expand in the fall, and we have greatly expanded our summer programs to provide quality, Christian childcare and learning opportunities for families inside and outside LCS.
• Our ongoing professional development planning and PLC days have helped us meet our K-12 Action Plan goals to improve learning for all students and ensure we maintain the very best opportunities for students to be equipped with critical, foundational skills in literacy, numeracy and social emotional regulation.

In 2021-2022, this community of parents, students, staff and volunteers have together worked hard to realize many of the goals our Board has established together with the Head of Schools, staff and stakeholders. We are thankful for the thousands of hands and efforts of everyone who gives selflessly of themselves to serve our students and families.

As we head into the quieter summer months, we will continue to pray faithfully that God will continue to bless the Mission and inspire our Vision for the future of Langley Christian School. We wish you safe travels or restful stays, wherever you find yourself in the coming weeks, and we cannot wait to see you again and continue our journey together impacting this amazing community.

Adam Woelders, Head of Schools

SUMMER OFFICE HOURS: 9:00am-4:00pm, CLOSED JULY 8-AUGUST 22