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Meet Josh & Harmony Longenecker, founders of the Classical Academy of Sarasota. They’ll inspire you with their approach to teaching history and how they’ve built gospel-centered relationships with both parents and students. Stay to the end to hear their thoughts on Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) and discover how Veritas Single Source makes life easier at their school!

Episode Transcription

Note: This transcription may vary from the words used in the original episode for better readability.

Marlin Detweiler:

Hello again and welcome to another episode of Veritas Vox, the voice of classical Christian education. Today we have with us Josh and Harmony Longenecker. Welcome.

Josh Longenecker:

Thank you. We're glad to be here.

Marlin Detweiler:

The Longeneckers, live in Sarasota, Florida, and have started a classical school. Tell us about your school and how it came to be.

Josh Longenecker:

So we moved here to Sarasota, Florida in 2010 and I took a job at a local charter school, just intending to teach fifth grade here. And, long story short, we just we became very disillusioned with what we saw in terms of the curriculum. We had come from a classical school in Colorado where we moved from and so we had seen classical education. We'd seen it done well. And, so through the Lord's guidance and a number of divinely appointed meetings, we decided to embark upon starting what at that point in time was the intent to start a charter school.

So in 2011, we kind of started down that journey. Over the course of a couple of years, it became clear that if we wanted to continue in this endeavor, we were going to have to become a private school.

The county here was kind of opposed to the idea of classical education. So end of 2013, beginning of 2014, we transitioned and decided to open as a private school. So we opened as a preschool through 10th-grade private school in the fall of 2014. At that point in time, we enrolled 187 students in those grades.

Marlin Detweiler:

Your first year?

Josh Longenecker:

The first year. Yes, sir. Yeah!

Marlin Detweiler:

I've been involved in starting three schools and I have worked with dozens of schools all over the country. Been there to help them start, probably in 30 cities. I don't think I've ever heard of a school starting with 187 students.

Harmony Longenecker:

It really was! It exceeded our expectations!

Marlin Detweiler:

We think so!

Josh Longenecker:

We were praying for 100.

Harmony Longenecker:

We needed to keep the lights on and pay our bills and we knew we'd be the first ones to not accept paychecks if we couldn't get there. But we had a little secret to it. And what had happened was I was teaching, pre-K at the time at just a little preschool here in town.

And we had been sharing this idea, the classical model, with everyone that would stop for five seconds and listen to us. And, so we would gather little groups in our living room and we had a few couples over one night shared it with them. And they were so excited aboutit- they'd never heard anything like this.

And so we said, “Well, let's meet them and, if you have anybody you think would be interested, bring them to our house and we'll just start sharing the ideas and the concepts and the philosophy behind classical education.” And so a month later, there was standing room only in our living room. This had sparked a movement, to be completely honest.

And it sparked such a movement in the Sarasota area that every time we would gather, there would just be huge groups that wanted to talk about it. And this is all pre-COVID by a lot. And, so what came from that is a little kind of pilot kindergarten group. That very first year, we were still trying to work with the county and convince them that a traditional classical liberal arts education would be great for their county, and they continue to disagree with that.

We had this little pilot kindergarten group, and we were writing, you know, memory work for science and history. And, and what we would do is have the kids meet.

Josh Longenecker:

We do it all the informational meetings.

Harmony Longenecker:

And we’d have the kids present what they were learning in history and science. And, you know, they'd be reciting the presidents and they'd be talking about metamorphosis. And, you know, we'd be going through what a typical classical classroom looks like and the differences between progressive education or modern education and classical education. And we had meeting after meeting after meeting, I'd say we did one every month and anywhere we could host and we'd go to libraries, we'd go to community halls, we'd go to churches anywhere we could do it.

And we would kind of just wait and when the dust settled, we were like, we not only hit 100, we hit 187 that first year. But the biggest thing was it going from, you know, just a vision or an idea that I'm getting to see the students who loved learning, who were so captivated and in on wonder as they were reciting, you know, photosynthesis or kingdoms, you know, the five kingdoms of living things. And they're five.

And then I would put out their work that they were doing, and the parents would argue with me. They'd say, “This is not the work of a kindergartner. There's no way.” And I'd say, “No. We just really focus on excellence and penmanship and our reading is all phonics-based.” And, as we would as we would just unpackage what it was, it sold itself.

Marlin Detweiler:

Reminiscing of 30 years ago when we were experiencing the same kinds of things. Laurie couldn't go to Publix in Orlando without somebody to say, “Hey, aren't you the one starting a classical school?”

Harmony Longenecker:

And yeah, exactly what would happen in Publix. We'd be in the lettuce section and people would be like, “We came to your last informational meeting!”

Marlin Detweiler:

How much time– I'm curious because I'm going to make a comparative statement that I think you'll like. How much time from the first meeting or first thought of starting to actually opening the doors first?

Josh Longenecker:

Two years.

Marlin Detweiler:

Okay.

Harmony Longenecker:

A lot of the work was with trying to be a charter.

Josh Longenecker:

We spent a year and a half of that almost that entire time writing a charter application. I wrote a letter application. It was rejected the first year. So we added 200 pages of additional research.

Marlin Detweiler:

Well. When I come back to that, because I have a worldview question about that I would come back to.

Just as a comparison. We met in Orlando on May 26th, 1992, to discuss the idea of starting a classical Christian school, having read Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning. And three months later, August 26th, we opened the school with 38 students.

Harmony Longenecker:

Oh my word.

Marlin Detweiler:

The difference between you and us was you had a little bit more time, but we had R.C. Sproul to lead our home group talks about the school that we were starting. He was available and willing to talk about the value of classical education. When you've already written 50 books of your own, it helps.

Harmony Longenecker:

It helps. We did have a couple of informational meetings where we would bring down Hillsdale professors and people that were helping with their program, trying to get these schools started all over the country. And same thing. When they would talk, I'd be like “Ta-da! Here are the experts. You know, we're the ones that will be here running this thing.” But let's listen to what the experts have to say of course.

Marlin Detweiler:

Let me ask you something. How much did it matter to you when you changed your mind about charter to private that you could be a distinctively classical Christian school?

Harmony Longenecker:

So we actually don't have the title Christian on our sign. We do not even have a faith statement in our founding documents. However, it meant everything to us as believers. I actually think that that's why the doors were shut in the charter public world, to be honest, we are both Christians, and the majority of our families and our teachers are Christians.

But what had started already, that's really neat for us is it was a group of families thinking it was going to be charter. And so some were faith-based families and some were not. We had some Jewish families. We kind of had a mix of everybody that was coming to these meetings and had started our first group, our first community.

And so when we decided to go, private people said, are you just going to go full Christian now? And we said, honestly, I don't think so. We really want to be able to bring in families that didn't attend a school that had Christian in the name. We talked to Hillsdale a lot about that. And ultimately, the community that we had fit exactly the school we were doing.

And so what we love about it is the hearts of the founders, the hearts of the teacher, the hearts of the families. It's seen everywhere. I mean, people tell us all the time they pull on campus and you absolutely can feel the Holy Spirit on this campus, and you absolutely can feel, just the faith and the heart.

But we have brought in so many families that wouldn't otherwise have their children in a school like this if we called it Christian. They have chosen not to go to the Christian schools for one reason or another. And so we actually feel like we have found that sweet spot and that we're bringing in families that need community and that need Christ. Obviously, that need faith in their home.

And what I was just going to say real quick, then what we've done is we've taken very seriously the training, that partnering with parents, not just the education. So we absolutely are. We exist to be an educational institution for sure, and have strong curriculum and great teachers and all the things.

But what's happened over the last ten years is that the thing that we're really known for is our community and our partnering with parents. So every single week we meet on Friday morning and we have brunch and we have coffee and we do a talk. I lead the majority of them. And it's things that matter to parents in raising kids in 2024.

It's things from discipline, why kids need God, it's how do we teach our kids about the birds and the bees – because that's not the school's role. How do we equip parents for that? And so we have taken that so seriously. And from that, we have just seen such a strengthening of the faith community that this is and it has become it has become known for that.

Josh Longenecker:

Yeah. What God called us to in the beginning as we prayed through this and transitioned from charter to private was ultimately that we are called to seek and save the lost and we saw this as a mission. We saw this as an opportunity for us to minister to families.

And so certainly and I tell families now as they come in for tours that that unashamedly, you know we kind of hook you in with the academics and we hook you in with the education, but we get you here because we're going to build a strong family. And so we have men's retreats that we host. We have women's retreats that we host, we host a marriage retreat, along with the Friday talks. We do that, unashamedly.

Marlin Detweiler:

That's an that's an opportunity for those people to be exposed to the gospel.

Josh Longenecker:

Yes. Yeah.

Harmony Longenecker:

And our talks always come back to the gospel as I think every one of these talks should, because ultimately that's what we keep saying. We don't actually know how you raise a family today, without knowing the Lord and without having faith. And so, from this, interestingly enough, from this, then we started having a group meet in our home every Sunday. It is a group of TCA families. And at one point, we were about 150 people that were gathering every Sunday. And the majority of those families did not have a church home. And they were not attending anywhere. Many of them would say, I've not stepped foot in the church in 20 years.

Marlin Detweiler:

You've created opportunity for evangelism through the education. Now, it creates some interesting challenges. And I want to ask some hard questions here. Are you up for them?

Harmony Longenecker:

Yes, always!

Marlin Detweiler:

I went to a public school. My wife went to a private Christian school. When we had children, we thought we lived in Florida at the time and we thought of education as something that was, I'll call it, morally neutral. The content of it was what made its worldview. And the thing that arrested me, caught me, was when I read Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning at the behest of R.C. Sproul, was that education was not morally neutral, that it was necessarily with a worldview.

The answer that you've given me so far has been about what you've been able to do in community, which is wonderful. But tell me, what do you do about the teaching of history and the teaching of Bible? Let me let me finish with the facts. I know you've got an answer for me, but I'm going to set the stage just one element further.

When I went to my public school, there was no discussion about the impact of the incarnation. And then, of course, there wasn't anything about things that followed that one thing that we might focus on more recently is the Reformation. Even though it's more than 500 years ago, there was an enormous historic impact.

And so consistent with that, I've said this on Vox before: if you Google ten most important events in history the incarnation, the resurrection, whichever element of Christ's appearance on earth you want to identify with, none of them are on maybe the first 20 pages, last time I did a Google search. And no one would argue that that is the least bit intelligent, whether they're a Christian and a believer or not. No one would argue He hasn't been one of the most influential things in history, if not the most influential thing in the history of all time, bar none, got to be in the top ten, should be number one.

How do you handle the teaching of history?

Josh Longenecker:

So we've always from the very beginning talked about our heritage, and we draw our heritage into Judeo-Christian heritage.

Harmony Longenecker:

Start we start with the Bible. We start history with creation. We start our story.

Josh Longenecker:

In the beginning, God created. We have to understand that in order to understand the founding of America, when we say we are all endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, if we don't understand that in the beginning we were created, well, then we can't understand where our rights come from. And so the authority structure that's created that ultimately that we have an authority that we answer to, and we see that hierarchy played out within a school.

We see that the students have a teacher who is in authority over them, that the teacher has an authority over them in a dean of lower school and upper school that ultimately I am the authority of the school, but I have a board over me, and so each of those things creates that authority structure. But then ultimately there is, an ultimate judge, and that God determines and deems what is good and what is evil. And so we have to call those things out.

Harmony Longenecker:

I was going to say, back to your question about history, the assumption that you just made everything that you just said about your worldview is absolutely the assumption in the worldview, that we lead history through. So, our four-year cycle that we do through history when they're in the first grade and the fifth grade, in the ninth grade, that's the assumption that we're starting with the Bible. We start with the Bible, and we start with the stories of the Hebrews.

Marlin Detweiler:

What would it look like to teach, say, the Edict of Milan or maybe more familiar, Martin Luther in the Reformation?

Harmony Longenecker:

So we teach it. I guess what I would say, maybe that would be different from a “Christian school” would be that it might come from more of a historical basis than a faith-based basis, but, I think the conversation that happens then, it's presented exactly how you're saying, which is that these are the most significant things that have happened in human history.

These are the most significant things. These were the these were history-changing events. And for sure they are absolutely connected. They are connected to faith. And I mean there's just no separating it. And so if that is your worldview, some of these questions, I actually don't think that they even wrestle with these because that is the foundation that as a school we say, this is what's been taught.

This is the material being taught, right? These are the books that we're reading. And so we don't actually get pushback on that. Interesting questions.

Marlin Detweiler:

Is there any teaching of biblical content as a class?

Josh Longenecker:

Yes. So many of our grades memorize different sections of the Psalms as they come up through the early grades. Again, a lot of those things can be set to tunes and simple chants.

Harmony Longenecker:

Some of it, some of it's just recitation.

Josh Longenecker:

So they'll memorize the Psalms, we study the Scripture, then, you know, we talk about Paul's fruits of the spirit. We talk about Plato's virtues. You know, it's important when we understand Paul, that when he says he was a Pharisee of the Pharisees, that he studied the law. But, we also understand that he was a man of the times.

And so he was studying the great philosophers at the time, which is apparent when he goes to Athens and he says to the people, “I see that you have a statue here to the unknown God. Well, let me tell you who this unknown God is.” And he makes a very philosophical argument.

Well, where does he get that? That idea of a philosophical argument? Well, he he must have studied, the philosophers Aristotle and Plato at the time because he understood how to argue with those people, and so we must therefore understand those arguments as well.

Harmony Longenecker:

The actual like Old Testament, New Testament. We've had them, I would say in the first five years we had them they were electives in the upper school, just an actual Old Testament class, New Testament class. Then we didn't for a couple of years because that teacher was gone.

And then just this summer, the conversation came back up that it's such a priority to us that the kids have that option, that they can take the class, that it's coming back. But again it is so important, to carefully pick a teacher there than an English class. I was so careful with that.

Josh Longenecker:

Yeah. And then as I get into high school we have a moral philosophy class where they read, Mere Christianity. They read The Abolition of Man. We study C.S. Lewis, they read the Confessions of Augustine. We want our kids to understand how the great minds of history have wrestled with these same questions. And we need to see that. We need to see how man and some of the great men and women of history have kind of dealt with these ideas of God and how God has influenced them and thereby influenced history.

Harmony Longenecker:

And then what my favorite part is, is getting to see just that yes, the end product, for lack of a better word, but to see the hearts of these seniors as they were working on their senior thesis, there was no separation. Like the things I learned in English or history versus the Scripture I'm pulling in. That's what I'm saying.

Like, it's funny to talk to someone from the outside and see it almost as separate things that we have to wrestle with, because we just haven't had to wrestle with it here. It is so a part of our worldview, and that probably comes from being the founders and that's our worldview.

Marlin Detweiler:

Free to shape thinking.

Harmony Longenecker:

Correct.

Josh Longenecker:

Yep. And that's the freedom a private school gives us is that you know, we can shape that unapologetically here.

Marlin Detweiler:

Good. Yeah, I'm going to change the subject now. There's been a phenomenon that has come to be in a number of states. I believe there are 13 currently. I expect that it'll grow to around 20. And it's abbreviated ESA, but it's in simple terms. It is now, through a Supreme Court ruling that relaxed the legal understanding of the separation of church and state.

And I'm not going to get into the historic versus the present understanding, because that in and of itself is silly to think about how much that has been turned on its ear. Yeah. But, in the relaxing of this, at a Supreme Court level, states have been able to adopt laws that allow for funding, at a state level to be available for private, even Christian education.

And 13 states today have varying rules for how that's done. Now, their motivation, in case there's somebody who really wants to understand the why, the state's motivation is it costs us less to give that money than it does to fund the public school. And so it's an economic move for them. At one level, sometimes there are worldview legislators that get to sneak in their worldview and help that.

And I say sneak in because it would not be done, openly, very easily with opposition to it, creating, challenges in Florida, which is one of the best states. And of course, you're located in Florida. Those funds are available currently at about $7,500 a student. Is that something that you have availed yourself of, and how is that impacted the idea of being a school that started as first year, 187 and now are about 1000?

Josh Longenecker:

Yeah, so honestly, when we were transitioning from charter to private, that was one of the big challenges that we looked at and the voucher system. And at that time it was an income based program. But that was one of the main catalysts for us transitioning to private. We never wanted tuition to be a barrier.

And so that allowed us to accept families from the very beginning that and we set our tuition at a level that, that voucher would cover tuition. And so from the very beginning, we've had 50% of our families that first year, and then that number has grown. That percentage has grown, now in this past year and then moving ahead into next year, 100% of our families, because of the expansion of the program within Florida are on that program.

And we accept that voucher has been a great blessing to us and to our families and made private education affordable for our families so that tuition isn't a barrier. So we have seen it as a great blessing. There certainly are some pieces that the state requires of us, but they've been very, minor. They're not invasive, in our opinion.

Marlin Detweiler:

Florida tends to be a bit more hands off that way at this point, and I can understand you're feeling that way because that's the way we look at it too.

Josh Longenecker:

Yeah. Yep.

Harmony Longenecker:

And of course we, you know, have our eyes wide open to the whole thing. And we're always watching it very closely because, you know.

Marlin Detweiler:

What would happen if it went away overnight?

Josh Longenecker:

We don't know. That's a great question. We we trust the Lord. And that in that step, it would certainly be a very painful thing. However, with like with most governmental programs to make something go away that's already been established and entrenched is a very difficult thing. There would be a tremendous uproar in the state of Florida over that.

I believe with the current administration and standing of the legislator legislation in Florida we have at least a couple of years left where this is only going to grow and expand and again, to take it away after it's been established for for that time is, is is near impossible within any government.

Marlin Detweiler:

So there would be a political price to pay for the people initiative setting of it.

Harmony Longenecker:

Yes. It's such an excellent program for the state of Florida and the other states that are implementing it, because it does give parents choice and, it doesn't matter what side of the aisle you fall on. I mean that is such a good thing for families. You're not taking a side. To me, it's as neutral as can be because we're just saying to parents, this money is yours, and you decide where you're going to put it. I feel like it's the great equalizer. I feel like it really does give parents what 2020, made all parents desire. I actually feel bad for states that don't have it in other states because I just feel like if you are satisfied with what you have, then that's excellent. Stay there for sure. Stay there.

If you can walk to your neighborhood school and you love those teachers and you love the curriculum, I am so for that. Yes, I'm not anti any of this. I just think it's great for families to be able to have all of it as a choice for families to say, this is what I want for my kid.

We do that with every other area of our life what we want to eat, what we want them to wear. You know what our decisions are as a family. And education was really the one where we didn't have choice. And so from the beginning, you know, before this even became the program, it is we have loved that because it gave families it would never be able to afford a private education.

Marlin Detweiler:

And that's what's that's been so exciting for us. We've been around the idea of classical Christian education for more than three decades. And the one pain point that I have never been able to get rid of is the fact that many people that want this education can't afford it.

Josh Longenecker:

Yes.

Marlin Detweiler:

And these programs have changed that for so many people. And it is a true blessing. You all are able to help them realize that we've been able to help them realize that. And that's really cool.

Harmony Longenecker:

Yes, we love it. And we've met people. before the interview started, you're asking us about it. We've worked with other schools in the state that were very nervous about it and skeptical about it, and we were able to talk through our experience with it and they were able to expand their program so much once they really understood it.

It feels especially in the early years, people would say this is too good to be true. And so, you know, we did so much research on it just to make sure. And we'd say, no it is such a good program for Florida families.

Marlin Detweiler:

Well, we're running out of time. But I have one last question. And it's very much a self-serving question, but you have been introduced to and become a part of our Single Source program, which is a program that has a lot of features to it. Because of our size, we're able to deal with virtually every publisher that classical schools are interested in. And so we decided to arrange a special program that says to schools like yours, if you'll agree to buy everything that you need, that we can provide through us, we'll give you all kinds of benefits. You're here because you are a very large Single Source customer of ours. Tell us about your experience with that.

Josh Longenecker:

So yeah, as I shared at the beginning, before we started, we were introduced to Single Source about five years ago. As we were growing a growing school at the time, about 460 students or so, we had tried dozens of different ways to order curriculum and piecemeal it together from the cheapest sources it was. And then organizing it all, there was a tremendous amount of administrative work.

Marlin Detweiler:

And yeah, you want to say, where's the pistol?

Josh Longenecker:

It was it was rough. And so when we were introduced to Single Source, it was one of those things I was like, “All right, we're going to try it. It sounds too good to be true.”

Marlin Detweiler:

But I just I want to just ask a parenthetical question. It wasn't too good to be true?

Josh Longenecker:

From the very beginning it has exceeded our expectations and exceeded our expectations in the way that you all handle the customer service side at the beginning from working with us on the orders, and making sure that we have the right sources, the right books, because our teachers get finicky about a particular literature book. You know, they want it from the right publisher.

Marlin Detweiler:

To be from the right publisher. The right edition.

Josh Longenecker:

Yeah, it's all those things. And your team works so well with us on finding those and then finding the best price. We have not been able to beat the prices you have provided for us. They have just exceeded, again, exceeded our expectations. They've reduced our overall expenditures. So we've been able to keep more money for the students here to provide, teacher raises, and all the things because of what Single Source provided us.

Then on the back end, the way it's packaged, the way it's shipped, from the delivery dates to the delivery methods, it shows up. It's already prepackaged for the for the classrooms, for the teachers.

Marlin Detweiler:

I want to make sure that's understood, because to me, that's really cool that we're able to do that. We literally box and label the room number on the outside of this, but your room number and your grade level is on that box for this. So you can take the box there unopened.

Josh Longenecker:

That's that. Yeah. And then as far as that administrative side, when things show up, we're not digging through boxes full of books. But the boxes, we simply deliver the boxes to the rooms, they're pre labeled, prepackaged. The teachers then can sort them. They have what they need. It has been a great blessing to us on so many levels.

Harmony Longenecker:

Absolutely. I was going to say, you know, from the teacher side, I'm working with the teachers constantly and our team that's ordering and all the things. And I just feel like it's freed up time and resources to do the things that we're all supposed to be doing. And we're not we're not having to worry about all of this anymore.

Marlin Detweiler:

Yeah. Well, our goal in this is to do what we do best so that you can do what you do best, because the administrative headache that you all go through, I was on I've been on both sides of this and I knew that if we could do those things, it would be an easy decision. The only question is whether or not it's too good to be true. And you're a testimony that it's not that.

Josh Longenecker:

It is everything. Single Source is everything that that you claim to be and more. It has been a fantastic program and we intend to continue to use it. I know I've been seeing emails go back and forth. We've already started placing our orders. We placed several of our orders already for the fall ‘24. And we intend to continue to use Single Source in the years to come.

Marlin Detweiler:

Well, it's been so good to visit with you, Josh and Harmony. Congratulations on a very successful school start and growth path. Wish you Godspeed and God's blessing, as we go forward. Thank you for joining me today.

Josh Longenecker:

Thank you so much.

Marlin Detweiler:

Folks. Thank you. This has been another episode of Veritas Vox, the voice of classical Christian education. We hope to see you again next time. Bye bye.

Josh Longenecker:

Bye.