Every once in a while...

... it's all worth it.

We have homeschooled all of our children. Not for all of their lives; and no longer. Brandon entered a private Christian school in mid 5th-grade. When he graduated to High School and our younger two boys entered the same private school, we were faced with a very hard decision...

We could send him to another private Christian school in the area - one which has an outstanding reputation, and we know would have served us all very well - but which was completely an totally beyond our financial reach.

We could bring him back and homeschool him for his high school years - which would not have served any of us well. He has thrived in a school setting, and it is what's best for him at this stage of his life.

We could get involved in some hybrid homeschool/classroom resources that are available locally - which, although we've heard some wonderful success stories about, we didn't feel was right for him.

We could send him to public high school.
The latter is what we ultimately chose to do - but not without significant consternation and concern.

Specifically - was he strong enough to influence his environment, or would he be influenced by it?

Well, we focused on this issue for an entire year before we finally made the decision to release him into the wilds of public school (which in-and-of-itself is probably a topic for another time)... And we've been watching carefully to see if our confidence was well placed.

Well, I received a call the other day from an administrator at Brandon's school. They are honoring him as an outstanding student - not in terms of academics, nor in athletics, but in terms of - as she put it: "making our lives better." Being polite, well behaved, not disruptive - embodying the characteristics that make a student memorable (in a positive way) to the faculty. One of his teachers nominated him, and all of his teachers supported him in it.

It's huge. To me, at least. It means that, regardless of anything else - something good has sunk in and he is reflecting the character of Christ to the world instead of absorbing the character of the world.

It's huge.