June 4, 2025 | Good Soil
A Year With PCS: Thoughts from Mr. Jorgensen
My first all-school chapel was delightfully shocking. After hours of teacher orientation and with my head reeling from the first weeks of school, I found myself in the back of the auditorium watching 250-ish students singing a tongue-twister song together–the typical pre-chapel pastime. That uniformity, even in something silly, and love for the same delighted me. By joyfully singing together, kindergarteners through twelfth graders were collectively buying into the school culture.
I came from a classical school of 650 students with a similar vision to love good things together. As a school grows, it becomes harder to have a close community with the whole school. A Lower School experience seems distant from that of an Upper School experience, and school culture is tough to regulate.
However, PCS stands, at this moment in time, in the sweet spot of classical schools. The community is onboard with the mission of the school, and the school’s work reflects its mission accurately and faithfully. The parents at PCS know they aren’t sending their children to the average prep school, and accordingly they want the school to build up their children in the Lord.
At the same time, PCS is not cheap. I don’t mean cheap in the financial way, but in the investment way. That costly investment in students is first evident in the faculty and staff. My colleagues are wonderful, thoughtful, respectful, intellectual, and funny people who love both their respective subject matter and their students.. What makes the faculty truly unique is that they have bought into the mission at PCS as much as the parents. It is not just a teaching job they happened to get in order to pay the bills; rather, it is a job they desire and cherish. The administration is an extension of this precedent. Mrs. Savage has chosen administrators who complement one another, putting teachers and students over themselves on a daily basis. It is tough to find hubris around here.
In the teacher’s lounge, I get called the “meanest teacher in the school.” I think I have earned this because my relaxed face is dour. I am aware of this. However, I love students. The students at PCS are some of the most respectful and kind children I have ever had the pleasure to teach. They do foolish things, to be sure, but that serves only as an opportunity to teach them. Their acceptance of that teaching is a credit to their parents and demonstrates their trust in the school to wield godly authority. Is it all sunshine and rainbows? No, of course not. Every school has its bumps in the road, and PCS is no exception. But during this time at PCS, where there is unifying mission alignment and a culture pointed to loving God and obeying his commandments, there is a sweet aroma.
As the year comes to a close, I want to leave you a charge: enjoy this blessed time. It is a gift from God to you and your children. Enjoy it by first and foremost being present in it. Say yes to volunteering at events. Say yes to staying late for basketball games. Say yes to supporting the play and musical. Say yes to investing in PCS culture.
Lastly, I would be remiss if I did not talk about my son. I am getting choked up just writing about this, but it must be said. Thank you so much to everyone who has loved my son even if it was just waving “hello” to him. I know he is more popular than I am, and that is just fine. I yearn for him to experience the love of Christ that you have given him this year in his future church. He loves his friends and caretakers at PCS, and we will sorely miss them all as we move on to Florida this summer.
