After School with RCS

2024 Advent Devotional 1: The People Who Walked in Darkness

In keeping with tradition, we're pausing from our normal podcast content to offer a weekly Christmas devotional throughout the month of December. Our passage of scripture for this series is Isaiah 9:1-7. Follow along so that we can celebrate the season together. Merry Christmas!
 
This is part 1 of 4.

What is the Classic Learning Test? An Interview with Soren Schwab

Beyond the four walls of Redeemer Classical School, the classical Christian education (CCE) movement is thriving. In 2010 there were roughly 140 classical Christian schools. Today there are over 1,500 schools serving more than 667,000 students. This growth has coincided with the growth of several key institutions and organizations that support CCE, such as the Society for Classical Learning, Classical Academic Press, and the Classic Learning Test (just to name a few). On today’s episode Aaron and Ron interview Soren Schwab, the Vice President of Partnerships at the Classic Learning Test (CLT). In the course of this interview, they discuss what makes the CLT different from other college entrance exams (such as the SAT and ACT), what’s happening in the world of higher education today, and the growth of classical Christian education more broadly. Please join us for a fascinating and lively conversation around these important topics.

20th Anniversary Interview: Rachel Kudzin (nee Augustine)

The 2024-25 school year marks Redeemer Classical School's 20th anniversary. To help us commemorate this milestone we're recording a series of interviews with founders, early adopters, and alumni. In the fourth installment in this series, we're speaking with alumna Rachel Kudzin (nee Augustine). Rachel attended Redeemer from 4th-8th grade, in the very earliest years of the school. She received a bachelor's degree in statistics from UNC Chapel Hill and is currently pursuing a master's degree at UNC Chapel Hill. In this episode she recollects what it was like to be a student at Redeemer as the school was just starting out. She also speaks to what makes Redeemer such a special learning environment, and, in the process, we discuss how Redeemer has changed and how it has stayed the same in the things that count most.

20th Anniversary Interview: Penny Fries

The 2024-25 school year marks Redeemer Classical School's 20th anniversary. To help us commemorate this milestone we're recording a series of interviews with founders, early adopters, and alumni. In the third installment in this series, we're speaking with alumna Penny Fries. Penny attended Redeemer from Kindergarten through 8th grade (the highest level we offered at the time). She is currently a senior at Vanderbilt University, majoring in Chemical Engineering. Penny shares what, in her mind, makes Redeemer such a special place and, along the way, offers some advice to current students for making the most out of their time at Redeemer.

20th Anniversary Interview: Brian Augustine

The 2024-25 school year marks Redeemer Classical School's 20th Anniversary. To help us commemorate this milestone we're recording a series of interviews with founders, early adopters, and alumni. In the second installment of this series we're speaking with Dr. Brian Augustine. Brian was Redeemer's Founding Board Chair and is an alumni parent, with three children who have attended Redeemer. In this episode we discuss what sparked an interest in Classical Christian education, the challenges that the school faced early on, and how the school has remained committed to its core values since its inception. Brian currently serves as the Chair of the Chemistry Department at Furman University and joins us remotely from Greenville, South Carolina.

20th Anniversary Interview: Bill Leach

The 2024-25 school year marks Redeemer Classical School's 20th Anniversary. To help us commemorate this milestone we're recording a series of interviews with founders, early adopters, and alumni. In the first installment of this series we're speaking with Bill Leach. Bill is the Pastor of Christ Presbyterian Church (PCA), husband to our beloved Rhetoric School teacher, Mrs. Annie Leach, and the father of five Redeemer alumni. He's also a founding board member. Join us as we dive into some of Redeemer's early history and the values and vision that led to the founding of our school.

AI and Education - The Negative Potential

There seems to be widespread agreement that AI will revolutionize the way we live and work. The biggest question, for now, is whether or not that revolution will be positive or negative. Will AI improve our quality of life, as its proponents say? Will it allow us to produce better work more efficiently? Or, as the detractors argue, will it make us more anxious, stressed, and busy? Will AI only further disrupt our relationships and, in the process, dehumanize us? 
 
In this episode, the fourth and final installment in our series on AI and education, Aaron and Ron discuss the negative potential that AI has for education. In the process they discuss the ways that AI could distort our understanding of the purpose of education, disrupt relationships, and lead to a dehumanizing experience.
Resources:
Amusing Ourselves to Death by Postman
That Hideous Strength by Lewis

AI and Education - The Positive Potential

There seems to be widespread agreement that AI will revolutionize the way we live and work. The biggest question, for now, is whether or not that revolution will be positive or negative. Will AI improve our quality of life, as its proponents say? Will it allow us to produce better work more efficiently? Or, as the detractors argue, will it make us more anxious, stressed, and busy? Will AI only further disrupt our relationships and, in the process, dehumanize us? 
In this episode, the third installment in a four part series, Aaron and Ron discuss the positive potential that AI has for education. In the process they discuss the ways that AI could prove helpful to teachers and students and, ultimately, allow for improved relationships and a more humane education.
Resources:
Social Acceleration by Hartmut Rosa