Campion Hall

Campion Hall Registration will remain open until September 6th, as long as classes have availabililty 
You may email [email protected] if you have any questions. 

Click here to register online.

What is Campion Hall:

In its third year, Campion Hall is a one day per week educational initiative of Presentation of the Lord Catholic Church with the purpose of supplementing and enriching  education for students who are either homeschooled or participate in hybrid learning. Open to kindergarten through seniors in high school, it is an a-la-carte program that allows families to augment their educational practices, and at the same time casts a Catholic vision of education alongside them. Parents will choose which courses in which to enroll their children,  and all students will be required to attend an age-level appropriate Catholic Culture class, with the older children taught by one our our priests.  Classes will be held Thursdays, with the day centered around the litugrical life of the parish.
 

Vision of Catholic Education:

True education has always rested on two presuppositions. The first is that truth is desirable for its own sake. It is good not for what it does, but for what it is. The second is that knowledge consists not in bending the truth to ourselves, but in conforming ourselves to truth. We can only conform ourselves to truth by freely embracing and loving it, and we can only love truth if we are enticed by its beauty. Love of beauty, therefore, has always been integral to the discovery of truth. True education has always sought to form the heart and mind, reason and will, desire and knowledge. In short, education forms the whole person in light of truth, beauty, and goodness.

Campion Hall seeks to educate children in the truest and fullest sense by giving them the necessary tools of learning, and by fostering wonder and love for all that is genuinely true, good, and beautiful. We seek to incorporate our students into the wisdom of two thousand years of Catholic thought, history, culture, and art so that they might understand themselves and their world in the light of the truth and acquire the character to live happy and integrated lives in the service of God and others. Education in this deep and comprehensive sense extends beyond the classroom and is more than just the acquisition of skills. It encompasses the whole of one’s life. For this reason, Campion Hall seeks to partner with families in the education of their children and their formation in the Catholic way of life.

Campion Hall and the Role of the Parish:

As part of the parish’s evangelizing mission, Campion Hall has a two-fold purpose: first, to communicate a certain body of knowledge; second, to cultivate a certain kind of person, to develop as far as possible what is uniquely human in him, and to equip him with the skills, habits, and aptitudes necessary to embrace truth and to become the person he was created to be.

Every Catholic parish has a duty to play a role in the education of its children as part of the Church’s evangelizing mission. Presentation must also recognize the contours of that duty within the local context of our parish. In this instance, well over half of our parish’s children receive their education via some form of homeschooling. In view of this, Campion Hall seeks to support, augment, and enrich the education of these students by providing, first, a Catholic context, and, second, a set of classes that individual families are not able to provide.

Serving these families seeks to honor and acknowledge the primary role parents play in educating their children, while inviting the families to educate their children in and with the mind of the Church. A family is only truly a family according to God’s design insofar as it is a part of the whole. No family is completely sufficient unto itself. It is not possible, therefore, to have a truly Catholic education as an isolated family. It requires taking part in the larger community, namely the parish. By offering supplemental education in the context of the parish’s life — both its sacramental life as well as on the physical grounds — the students and families will grasp more deeply the reality that education is faith seeking understanding.

Catholic Education and Culture:

St. John Paul II emphasized in his letter Ex Corde Ecclesiae that Catholic education is truly a means by which culture is produced and developed through the courageous exploration of revelation and nature. Therefore, Campion Hall also seeks to receive, explore, and develop an authentic Catholic culture that has the power to dignify and convert the heart. It is this goal that will give unity and coherence to the diverse classes and pedagogies. It includes the development of a series of courses that explicitly seek to impart that culture, and these courses form the spine of the program.

Campion Hall’s Characteristics and Logistics:

Classes are offered on Presentation’s campus by teachers who are independent contractors and not employees of Campion Hall. All teachers are required to teach in accordance with the Catholic faith, and to know in what way their particular discipline relates to revealed truth. Teachers are asked to sign an oath of fidelity to the magisterium of the Catholic Church, upon which our educational vision is based. Teachers have the freedom to teach both the content and with the method they find best suited to the pursuit of knowledge in their respective field. The goal is to find teachers who are highly motivated and have a passion for their subject. Further, the preferred style is the tutorial style, especially in the upper grades. The tutorial style is defined by small class sizes emphasizing discussion of a text instead of lecturing. This method is not only venerable, but it is also in accordance with the parish culture Presentation has received and seeks to enrich.

Teachers are free to set their own fees (in consultation with Campion Hall), duration of the classes, and materials used. The available teaching schedule is formed around the liturgical life of the parish.

Students are free to take as many classes as they like. Because Campion Hall is a supplemental program, it will not issue transcripts, but will provide grades for each class. All students are expected to take the single, core, tuition-free “Catholic culture” class (or a course deemed equivalent by Campion Hall).

Governance of Campion Hall:

Campion Hall requires an oversight board made up of the pastor, parishioners, and other Catholics familiar and dedicated to the flourishing of education and culture. The board serves as the reviewer of curriculum, seeking to ensure that what is being taught is in line with the vision of the project. All courses must be approved by submitting the curriculum to the board of Campion Hall. The board also assists in vetting potential teachers.

The board functions in the parish as the liaison between the pastor and the parish. It is expected to articulate Campion Hall’s purpose and mission to other parishioners, as well as how this mission relates the larger mission of the parish. The board also works with the pastor to ensure that Campion Hall serves as a ministry of the parish, neither being wholly independent, nor being the sole focus of the parish’s life.