Superintendent’s Blog – Saying Goodbye

Saying goodbye to the school year…

School’s out for summer and tomorrow we begin gearing up for the 19-20 school year.  At this moment it is important for us to take a minute to consider and celebrate the accomplishments of our students, faculty and community this past year. It’s also important to say thank you to every member of the community who made this year a successful one!

I am so proud of our abundant life, academic, artistic and athletic achievements that I find myself anxious for the 19-20 school year to get here. Today, I want to highlight what God has done this year.  Next week, I will post a second blog post to discuss what is coming for next year.

Abundant Life

Our students excelled in worship and spiritual growth through multiple planned and unplanned events.  We had over 50 decisions for Christ during our Middle School spiritual emphasis week. Our High School sent 11 students on the Jamaica mission trip and 14 to Peru.  It is an encouragement to see our students of all ages being the hands and feet of Christ both in our local community and abroad. The immeasurable value of surrounding students with Christian teachers and mentors was powerfully expressed by Gillian Scarboro, Class of 2019, in her testimony at Senior Chapel. Click here to watch.

Academics

Our Graduation was inspiring last Friday night as we focused on the Class of 2019 and how they exemplify the elements of our portrait of a graduate.  Almost half of the class graduated with honors and 77% of this class took AP, honors and dual enrollment courses during their time at Parkview. Our Valedictorian and Salutatorian were both 13 year seniors.  What they have accomplished at Parkview is amazing and they will go on to lead this class in doing great things.

We have a sharp group coming up behind them as well. At Middle School awards night, we celebrated the 51% of our 7th grade class selected for Duke Tip Scholars program.  To be selected for this elite group, you must score in the 95th percentile on a standardized test. Parkview chooses to have our students take one of the most challenging standardized tests, the Educational Records Bureau’s CTP.  

The Southern Baptist Association of Schools had their first academic achievement competition this year – Knowledge Quest. Over 500 students competed. Our students performed better than we could have imaged swepting 1st 2nd, and 3rd places in the following categories: 3rd grade English & science; 4th grade science, 5th grade math, 6th grade math, 7th grade math, science, old testament, new testament, & English; 8th grade history, geography, old testament, new testament & English; 9th grade old testament, 10th grade new testament, and 11th grade biology. Our students also took first place in the following categories: 3rd grade history, 4th grade history, 5th grade English, 6th grade history, 7th Grade history/geography, 11th grade music theory, 12th grade physics and 12th grade English.

Arts

Our musical, The Little Mermaid, received rave reviews from our entire community!  Mrs. Kaiser, Mr. Pike, Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Lissard and our high school students do a magical job of transforming our high school gym into a cozy theatre with professional quality staging, lights, and sound. Even more amazing is the level of talent, dedication, and stage presence of our 80 student actors, dancers, vocalists, and crew.  If you have never experienced our Middle School’s one act play performances, make plans to attend next year. The writing talent of Mr. White combined with our middle school students’ creativity, humor, and ingenuity never disappoints.

Athletics

Parkview continues to be strong in athletics.  Our students compete annually in final and semi-final rounds in multiple sports.  This year our state track athletes excelled, the Lady Eagles softball team strived for a 3-peat at state, our baseball team made a semi-final appearance, our football program is building momentum and preparing to debut a new look in the fall, and our basketball teams went deep into the playoffs.  Our swim team did outstanding led by Jolie Liles’ record setting pace. These are just a few examples of how our teams performed this year on the field. Off the field, we had 31 student athletes achieve Academic All-State honors. I know this energy will carry over to next year and I cannot wait to see our athletic programs continue to compete at the highest levels.

I want to end this year by sending out a big THANK YOU to all of our parents, students, staff, and volunteers who have pulled together to make this a memorable and productive year.  Take a deep breath and enjoy it because the preparation for next year starts tomorrow. I can’t wait. Have a blessed summer!