Harvest 2008-2009

Even as I write 2008-2009, I get goosebumps. This is their senior year! This is it. We have one more year to master Algebra, refine writing skills, and figure out where everyone is going to college! It is going to be an exciting year. Here are a few of the details.

Our curriculum is focused on college preparation. Each of our students has a few areas where they need extra time, so we are working to build that into our classes. Fall semester classes include Senior Math, British Literature, Government/Economics, College-Prep, and Sociology. We are excited for the kids to delve into some of these more mature subject areas.

They will also be involved in another fundraising project as we plan for our Fall Trip. This fall we are headed through Detroit to New York, Boston, and Philadelphia. I think this will be another incredible experience and opportunity to learn about our history firsthand.

We are excited to be joined by another student - Nicole Edwards. She has been close with both of us for the last few years and is actually living with Cassie currently. Nicole is a determined and committed student, and she will definitely be a blessing to our little community.


As we look forward to this last year, we ask that you would prayerfully consider supporting us financially. Please contact us if you need any information or have any questions.


Also, and most importantly, please pray for us. Pray that we would be good teachers and would prepare our students for what lies ahead. Pray that they would each seek God's plan for their life and would have the courage to follow Him. Pray that God would help us to love each other well and would bless the time we spend together for His glory.

From the Windy City to the Heart of Dixie

Although this post is very late and it has been almost three months since our trip to the South, I still get excited as I think about it. After Cassie and I returned and people asked about our week with the kids, neither of us could stop smiling as we responded, "It was the best trip I have ever taken with teenagers."

It's true - it was an amazing trip. Our whirlwind itinerary took us from Chicago through Memphis, Birmingham, Selma, Atlanta, and Nashville in less than six days. We saw Dr. King's grave, walked across the Edmund Pettus bridge, and ate some absolutely fabulous Memphis-style barbeque.

And though the sight-seeing was amazing, it wasn't what made Cassie and I glow when we talked about the trip; it was our kids who blew us away. They were amazing. They seemed to really soak in each sight that we visited, and neither of us can remember hearing one single complaint during those five days.

For me, the most vivid memory of the trip was sitting beside the Alabama River in Selma, AL. We were listening to Ms. Joanne Bland talk about her experience during the infamous "Bloody Sunday" march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. I looked around and realized that the kids were deeply moved. She charged us to continue the fight that she and others had begun at that march. As we left, and even now, the kids all said that that was their favorite part of the entire trip. It was a very cool moment.

Thank you to all of you who supported the kids as they raised the funds for our trip. The trip was a blessing that I don't think they will ever forget. We all learned a lot, and I think our students learned that they like learning.

Dear Friends and Supporters of Harvest!

We know that we are long past due for an update, and we apologize! The truth is, neither of us are particularly gifted at remembering to keep our friends (and even our families) updated on our lives, and being surrogate moms to nine teenagers definitely doesn't help… so please forgive us! We are so incredibly grateful for all of your support in all of your many ways and when we go for months without saying so, please know that it is not because we are not thankful!

So what's been going on at Harvest? We are wrapping up the first quarter of school and classes are well underway. On the whole, our students are achieving above and beyond what they have ever done in the past. Specifically, our students are engaging in their classes, scoring well on tests, and consistently arriving on time. We have seen special growth in our boys as they are motivated by newly found academic success.

Of course, many of our academic successes need to be measured relatively. The average ACT score of our students from a diagnostic test given in September hovers around 14. Obviously, we expect these scores to rise significantly, but we have realized that we are struggling against years of lies about what it takes to be accepted and graduate from a four-year college. It is flabbergasting to think that some of our students have made it this far having never mastered the foundational grammatical or mathematical skills we take for granted, and are yet determined to secure (and even feel a little entitled to) a spot at an Ivy League or other elite university.

We have slowly been trying to redirect their dreams into more realistic and achievable goals. Our curriculum is structured so that we can master basic skills as well as cover necessary material. We are also teaching an ACT Prep class through Cambridge Educational Services and making numerous college visits. We are encouraging each student to explore various post-high school options including four-year schools, community colleges and vocational schools. We have only the slightest inkling of what God has planned for them; all we know is that He must have planned something great, because each one of them has been given a second (or third) chance to finish high school with us at Harvest.

Now for a few highlights from the last two months: first, our kick-off retreat at Lindsey’s parents’ home in Cedar Falls, Iowa, was a huge success! We spent three days in the Andersons’ sprawling backyard playing flag football, riding the ATV, and hitting golf balls into the cornfields. We also (against the advice of the nice man in the plumbing aisle at Home Depot) taught the kids how to build potato guns out of PVC pipes, hairspray, and a flint. Who thinks it’s a good idea to teach kids how to build explosives? Apparently, we do (in the name of science, of course)!

More recently, we took the kids for a week-long Fall Trip to Edgewater, Maryland. We stayed at beautiful Camp Wabanna where Lindsey and her husband Mike had been on staff for years. While on the East Coast we spent time in Washington, D.C., visiting the monuments and memorials, the Holocaust Museum, Arlington National Cemetery, and the White House. We also spent a day in Baltimore wandering the Inner Harbor and serving lunch at the Helping Up Mission, where our students learned about the mission’s spiritual and physical rehabilitation programs for men recovering from addiction. Perhaps the most memorable part of the trip, however, was the day we spent in Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia. After a morning of learning about the historical significance of this small town (where some of the very first slave revolts happened before the Civil War), we spent the entire afternoon rafting down the Potomac River. It was a beautiful, warm, autumn day, and we even had a chance to swim down some class-3 rapids!

In their spare time, many of our students have been busy with sports and after-school jobs. Lloyd and Jarrett both worked hard to play on the Walther Lutheran football team and are preparing for play-offs this weekend! Katherine and DeDe were both accepted to participate in a paying, after-school drama program that meets at the community center. Erica is working at Target, and Angela recently began working at the catering company of Harpo Studios!

It has been amazing to see God work in our lives and in the lives of our students over just the last few weeks. The addition of Karen Odom to our little homeschool family was an answer to prayer, as are the regular devotionals led by Sonia Stewart, and (more recently) various members of the Chicago Fellowship! Jesus is daily turning our mourning into dancing and our ashes into beauty! We wish you could see the slowly growing security and peace in each of our kids. We are not without our frustrations, but we all (including the kids) feel a true sense of family, and enjoy showing up for school 99.9% of the time.

And so we close with another great big thank you to all of you who support us each day financially and spiritually. You mean a great deal to us and we don’t even know how to begin to express how grateful we are for letting God use you to let us live out our dream jobs… because this is our dream job. We both feel deeply that this is not only what God has called us to do, but what he has created us to do—teach and disciple and equip teenagers who are under-resourced and under-served and under-loved in this city. And we are able to do this each day because of your loving support.

You, O Lord, Keep our lamps burning;
our God turns our darkness into light.
Psalm 18:28.

By His Grace,

Cassie and Lindsey
Amanda, Frank, Jarrett, Katherine,

Lloyd, DeDe, Angela, Cindy, and Erica