November 2015 Newsletter

Warrior Challenge Results

Our Warrior Challenge results are now tallied.  The students raised $8,099.45!  With our sponsorships, the total raised from this event was $10,519.45!!  Congratulations to the top 3 student fundraisers:  Casher ($985), Braden ($561.95) and Landon ($474) and they will be treated to lunch with Mr. Hahn at a restaurant of their choice.  The winning tribe is Eleazar and they will get a trip to Defy Gravity this week.  The students in Eleazar are Stephen, Casher, Shiloh, Kenan, Matthew, Kyle, Luke, Graham, Jonah, Ashton, Landon, DeAngelo, Will, Zach W, Braden, and Logan.  Thank you to the parents for your generosity and continuing to be generous when your son did way more push-ups, sit-ups or squats than you were planning to sponsor!  Please let all of your son's donors know how appreciative we are of their support of our school.  Thank you too to our business sponsors who helped to underwrite the prizes and expenses of this event.  Our public thanks to you will be on Iron Academy's website very soon.

Student Dietary Needs

We often have student class activities that feature food.  So that students with special dietary needs may be included, parent Christi Gram has generously offered to bring in equivalent foods that meet the needs of our students.  If your son has any food allergies or dietary restrictions, please tell those to Anne York as soon as possible and we'll be sure that your son's food needs are included in our class activities.   

Christmas Sales Fundraising

The IPF has four fundraising projects that seek to direct some Christmas spending our way.  Please let your coworkers, friends, and family members know about these ways to save money by shopping with us and 50% of their purchase supports our school.  We hope that both parents and sons can reach out to those who would be interested in buying these items.  Here are brief descriptions but download the flyers below for more details.

1) Autobell car wash tickets.  We are selling the full service car wash tickets for $15.99, which is the same as Autobell charges but we are also doing bulk discount purchases of 10 tickets for $144 (equivalent to buying 9 and getting 1 free) or 20 tickets for $256 (equivalent to buying 16 and getting 4 free).  We are selling these until December 12. 

2) Live Christmas wreaths.  Large  beautiful wreaths for $25.  The last day to order and pay is December 1 and the wreaths will be at IA for you to distribute to your buyers on December 7.    

3) Red Rooster Coffee.  Iron's Meredith family has a microroasting business and they are partnering with us to fundraise by selling a choice of El Salvador Dark Roast beans (full-bodied, almond) or Organic Fair Trade Timor Maubesse Medium Roast beans (smooth, cocoa with hint of cinnamon).  Price is $11.99 for a 12 ounce bag.  We will have a website to order and pay online to Red Rooster.  Customers can order weekly through December 18 and the coffee bags will be given to you each Monday at school for you to distribute to your customers. 

FLYERS:  Here is a flyer in Word or PDF version that describes these products and is an easy way for you to add your name and copy and distribute to your friends, family, and coworkers. 

ORDER SHEET:  Here is an order sheet to help keep track of which product your customers are buying, when the payment is made, and when the product is delivered.  This order sheet also has instructions and deadlines for selling these items.

4) Our fourth fundraising opportunity is with the Christmas Toy Exchange through the Kids Exchange at the state fairgrounds.  We are gathering specific items by November 19 to donate to Iron Academy that will be sold at this event with IA receiving the funds of the sale.  Please see the tab above for more details about this fundraising opportunity.  Please ask your family and friends if they have items they can donate to us too.

It will be a tremendous blessing to our school if we could raise at least $10,000 from these activities.  Also remember to ask your friends and family if they will support us through our retail programs that have no additional cost to them.  See the "Retail Fundraising" tab above for the list of our retail opportunities and please consider using the free Shoparoo phone app in which you simply take photos of any store receipt and Iron can earn money and entries in $1000 per month sweepstakes.  On the second Tuesday of every month, Iron Academy is the featured school at Kamado Grille.  We get 10% of all purchases from 5:30 to 8:30, so please invite others to go out for a delicious dinner and support our efforts to build gentleman scholars.   

School News

Will receiving his Challenge Coin

Signing the Challenge Coin Contract

Challenge Coin Ceremony:  Iron Academy students who have been to Crucible Camp and have declared themselves worthy and have been deemed worthy of practicing and modeling the Honor Code will be entrusted with a responsibility that none of their peers outside of Iron Academy has experienced: as a member of the Iron Academy Round Table they will have the responsibility and burden to sharpen their Iron Academy brothers and to hold them accountable to the Honor Code (Proverbs 27:17.)  As a symbol of their lifelong commitment and responsibility, these students will be issued their Honor Code Challenge Coin.  The Challenge Coin is to be protected and passed along to their sons, grandsons, or great-grandsons.  It is to be shared with his future wife, to remind her that he knows who he is in Christ and that he has been honed for true biblical manhood.  It is a constant reminder of who they are designed to be by the Creator of the Universe.  On October 30, the Challenge Coin Ceremony was held for a few new students to receive their Challenge Coin and for a few returning students to have their coins returned to them after forfeiting the coins due to Honor Code violations.  Congratulations to our students who are deemed worthy to possess the Challenge Coin! 
  

Blade Maintenance Plans:  The Blade Maintenance Plans will be distributed in the coming week in the carpool line.  The plans are organized in a new format this year with its model from the description of Jesus in Luke 2:52 "And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man." 

Casual Dinners by Grade Level:  Mr. Hahn is meeting with the parents of each grade to discuss the fall campaign to bring more people into the Iron Academy movement.  The 9th graders already had their dinner and we have dinners scheduled for the 6th grade on Wed Nov 4, the 8th graders on Sat Nov 7, and two choices for the 7th graders of Fri Nov 6 or Wed Nov 11.  Sign-up Genius messages have been sent out.  If you're not able to make it on the night for your son's grade, contact Jenni Jordan about joining the meal for another evening. 

Athletics:  Our soccer season has completed with our middle school team finishing strong for a 3-2 record by winning the final two games.  Highlights of the season include a thrilling comeback after trailing St. Raphael 0-2 at halftime by making 3 goals in the first 10 minutes of the second half to secure their victory and carrying that momentum to playing their best game by dominating the play against a talented team from Raleigh Christian Academy.  The high school JV soccer team had some strong games but unfortunately did not have a winning season with the higher level of competition.  Our middle school basketball tryouts have been completed and the members of the basketball team are: Stone, Jackson, Byron, Ashton, Logan, Matt, Braden, Bryson, DeAngelo, Jon, Zac L, Elijah, and Landon.  The home court for basketball is at Wendell Community Center since the gym floor at Radiant is not equipped for game play.  The games are listed on the events calendar with the first home game on Nov 10.  We also have started the Wrestling Club for all students at 6:00-7:30 on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. Please contact our 6th-7th grade PE coach, Jon Mitchell, if your son is interested in learning how to wrestle.

Javaun and Brock with an
edible Parthenon

Classroom Activities:  The Intensive Weeks are always an enjoyable break in the school schedule.  The 9th graders had a week of guest speakers on the college application process and a visit to UNC.  The 8th graders did robotics and service projects for the Tri-Area Food Pantry and landscaping work for Radiant Church.  The 7th graders did Art History and had their own art exhibit.  The 6th graders learned about orienteering and robotics.  Here is a folder of photos of some of these Intensive Week activities.  

Our 6th graders recently enjoyed making replicas of the Greek Parthenon from graham crackers and marshmallows!  Upcoming activities this quarter include: Re-enacting the meals and espionage activities of the Minutemen for 7th grade, making potato canons and meals of the Revolutionary War soldiers for 8th grade, acting out scenes from Julius Caesar with plastic swords in 6th grade, student created videos in Spanish, learning the sports of rugby, ultimate Frisbee, and tennis polo as well as their strength and conditioning training in 8th and 9th grade PE, and learning about human reproduction, cell growth, and chemistry in middle school science. 

READING:  While it is well known that girls on average do not do as well as boys in math and science, a fact that is less publicized is that boys on average lag behind girls in reading and writing.  Part of building gentleman scholars is creating a culture of reading for IA students.  We are rapidly building our middle and high school libraries and Ms. Vacher would like more of our students to check out books more often.  Please work with your son to check out our library books which are specifically chosen for their interests.  Every student is to read at least one book per quarter that is not required to be read for class ("outside reading").

November Events

The school events calendar can be found on the tab above and on Iron's website at http://www.ironacademy.org/events-calendar/. Our upcoming events include:

• Every Wednesday morning: parent prayer meetings at 7:45-8:30.
• Wed 4th: 6th grade dinner at Winstead's home at 7:00 pm
• Fri 6th: NO CLASSES - Teacher Work Day
• Fri 6th: 7th grade dinner at Jordan's home at 7:00 pm
• Sat 7th: 8th grade dinner at Doster's home at 7:00 pm
• Tues 10th: Home basketball game at 4:30 pm
• Tues 10th:  Kamado Grille Spirit Night (wear IA spirit shirts!)
• Wed 11th: FATHER'S BREAKFAST at 7:30 am
• Wed 11th: 7th grade dinner at Denise Hanna's house at 7:00 pm
• Fri 13th: Basketball game at St. Raphael at 4:15
• Tues 17th: Home basketball game at 4:30 pm
• Thurs 19th:  Basketball game at Thales-Apex at 4:30
• 23rd to 27th: NO CLASSES - Thanksgiving Break