Three Ways to Give toward Our K-12 Educational Initiatives this Season

We're kicking off our #GreatGain giving campaign this Giving Tuesday with three essential causes: Biblical Education in the Developing World, Global K-12 Education, and Sustainable Christ-Centered Community Building.

We'll hope you'll take a moment to listen to (or read) GOD Int'l founder Gregg Garner as he talks about the heart behind our global K-12 Education cause this year.

The following is a transcript version of the video linked above.

Another opportunity that we have for you this Christmas season is this chance to be able to support our educational initiatives, specifically for kids from kindergarten to what we would have as the equivalent of 12th grade.

Now, how do we do this? There are three different ways that we are participating in the education of this specific demographic.

The first is through our Academy home education program. What this does is it gives to students, no matter where they're at around the world, the opportunity to become remote learners in the classroom.

With Academy students here in Nashville, our classrooms are outfitted in such a way that the technology allows for a student from Uganda to literally sit in the classroom virtually by being on a TV screen, of which then there's this camera that follows the speaker. There's multiple frames on the camera. One is on the teacher, one is on the students. And the student abroad could be heard through the television and participate in the same way that students in the classroom are able to be heard by the student abroad. And it happens all in real time time. We coordinate this with our various regions so that these young people get the type of education that we are offering at the Academy.

If you don't know about what God's done with the Academy for GOD, let me tell you a few things. In the last 12 years, not only have we been one of the more awarded schools in the local Nashville area, everything from best private school, the best elementary school, and best secondary school, we've been blessed to be recognized along these lines. But also now, as a Cognia accredited school, we were recently awarded with Cognia's highest distinction award. And this was an award given to about 50 schools where in the running there was about 2,000 schools. And we are one of those because they saw that the type of education that we're offering is in many ways the future for a lot of educational institutions who are willing to go in this direction. So what we have is a very quality product. In fact, it was so quality that during the time of COVID we launched this internationally because a lot of our young people who were around the world, their schools shut down, even some of them indefinitely. Others for a couple years at a time. In fact, there was a time during COVID that the only kid getting educated in one of our countries was a kid who was a remote learner for the Academy home education curriculum. But during that time, when some of our students got to participate in that and then their schools opened back up, we had to have a meeting with all those students, parents, because they said, can you please keep this going for us?

Because our kids are thriving, they are loving school, they are producing work like we haven't seen them been able to produce. It is such a good experience for them. Is it possible that you could keep it going even though schools have opened up and we had to get together and say, gosh, this is a pretty amazing thing, that they would trade in a virtual experience over and above them actually going to their respective schools. And since that time, it's been a couple years now, not only have we kept the program going, but we've actually graduated several students this year. In fact, we're going to graduate three more students from the academy home education program in East Africa alone.

We are wanting to make this more available to various families and students who are capable of participating in this type of educational curriculum. So the first opportunity you have is to help a scholarship, these international young people into an innovative educational opportunity specifically for junior high and high school.

The second opportunity that we have is with our brick and mortar school. I'm so happy to announce that we have our first international brick and mortar Academy for GOD. And it is located in Uganda. At this point, we've started with just a kindergarten class and we've got about 50 kindergarten kids. But we want to be expanding that a few grades every year. We're going to need your help.

It's not super expensive to be able to do this, but without your help, we're not able to give the quality education that these kids deserve. Now, it's not the same education that they get here at the Academy. Contextually, it doesn't work. It's more similar to what they might get within their relatively proximity institutions. Schools they could have gone to. But the difference is in two things: One, the teachers that we're hiring are legitimately people who care and who are ministerial minded and who recognize what they're doing is not just a job, but a calling. The second thing is that this school has within it a biblical curriculum.

In the same way, at the Academy we focus on these five pillars or these categories of learning. The academic, the social, the emotional, the moral and the spiritual, which permeates all of it. That same philosophy is taking place in Uganda at this Academy, starting with kindergarten. And these kids are going to become biblically literate kids as they go through the program at large. We're really believing and hoping that as we expand a couple grades every year, that we're going to see the fruit of this type of biblical education in that community. Because these kids deserve the best and we want to give them the best. So Your help is going to help us, one, make sure that we've got the right kind of personnel, the right kind of teachers, and so that they're adequately compensated.

Third, that we're able to make sure that our kids have the best supplies to make sure that they're able to fulfill expectations related to classwork. So we're talking about backpacks and uniforms and shoes and all of the stationery that they need to make it happen. Finally, we also want to bring about the kind of training that makes it so that the school is not just like every other school in the area, but it's indeed a school that shares the biblical philosophy that we have here at the Academy.

So in review, first, we've got students who are capable of attending the Academy for GOD, junior high and high school remotely online. And they need help being able to do that. Your money will help us outfit them with an iPad. It'll help us scholarship the experience so that we are effectively stewarding the resources and making sure these guys get the best education. But also at our brick and mortar school, one of many to come, we're able to now fund the operations of that school. And I'm so excited for you to see some of the footage of what's going to be happening over there. It's a real, real powerful, wonderful thing.

Finally, we also have an after school supplemental biblical education program for kids who are between the ages of 10 and 20 years old. And this takes place within the context of various schools in these different countries. So let's say, for example, Kenya. In Kenya we work with over 100 schools. And in these different schools we have these breakout groups. And these breakout groups create several hundred breakout groups. Usually they're about the size of 25. And we have on the ground leaders who then are teaching after school Bible programs. And we need your help to make sure that they have the resources to be able to do this. You see, while these kids are going to public schools, they are learning a bunch of subject matter, but they are not learning the word of God. And in the way that we're able to teach it and the way that our people on the ground are able to teach it. And it's that word of God that is going to open up their minds and get them to become the kind of people that bring about transformation for their communities at large. We need your help to be able to supply that after school educational resource for these communities of kids in these various schools.

So in review one more time, you've got 1) an opportunity to help a scholarship junior high and high school students into the Academy Home Education remote learning program. 2) You can help us to build up our first international brick and Mortar Academy for GOD in Uganda by sponsoring kids going to school their supplies and helping us train teachers and provide teachers and then finally 3) our after school Bible curriculum that is implemented by our different leaders in these various communities who are going to the public schools, breaking them into groups and teaching the Word of God. You have the opportunity to be able to invest in this way and this is going to be great gain for the Kingdom. Thank you so much. We really need your help, so go ahead and give.