Purpose & Philosophy
Forest Hills Lutheran School is a
Lutheran Christian school encompassing grades K-8. It is owned and operated
by the Westside Lutheran School Association. The school is both a Lutheran
parochial school for the members of sponsoring congregations and an outreach
school for families in the community. The affairs of the school and the
association are administered by a Delegate Assembly and a Board of Directors.
We recognize that our school is uniquely Lutheran and that one of the main
responsibilities of our school is to provide the means and opportunities
for the Christian education and faith development of our students.
We serve students from all spiritual backgrounds. We select and retain students only on the basis of our ability to meet their spiritual, academic, emotional, and physical needs and on the basis of their attitude and involvement in our mission.
By creating an environment of support and structure, our
faculty and staff assist in the development of the whole child - body,
mind and spirit. We seek to establish a partnership with parents, to involve
them in school activities, and to have open communication between school
and home.
Our Goals are to Help Our Students:
- Learn to research, organize and use information.
- Be creative and productive.
- Master essential skills in reading, writing, speaking, and computing.
- Develop social science, math, science, art, music, and technological literacy.
- Be physically fit and active.
- Develop the ability to reason and think critically.
- Develop the ability to analyze and synthesize information in the formation of opinions and behaviors.
- Develop the ability to solve problems.
- Develop and maintain beliefs and behaviors rooted in the Bible.
- Develop the values of self-discipline, responsibility, compassion, and friendship, humility, work, courage, perseverance, honesty, loyalty, and faith.
- Develop an awareness of other cultures.
- Become active and effective members of their community and church.
- Experience a strong sense of Christian community and be committed
to serving other.
We do this in the following ways:
- We foster a teaching environment that is challenging, safe, comfortable, caring and nurturing.
- We use instructional practices that balance independent creativity and structured learning.
- We use curricular materials that include core skills and knowledge, moral and religious training, physical education, and time for the creative and performing arts.
- We offer a co-curricular program that extends classroom learning.
We create a school community that models and nurtures self-discipline, faith, learning and respect and empathy for others.
Because our administration and faculty are committed to ongoing professional development that promotes student learning, we will continue to research and use new learning and instructional practices that have been proven effective. We are committed to a growing program which shall one day encompass additional programs at the early childhood and secondary levels. We will continue to implement a curriculum that is appropriate in approach, resources, scheduling and content.
