Psalm 51:12  “Restore to me the joy of Your salvation  and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.”

Every fall we take the entire high school on a Spiritual Retreat with the goal of giving them a chance to take a personal and collective renewal into the upcoming school year. If you have ever been on one of those retreats, you know that there is a lot of emotion and promise-making, and you also know that eventually it has to play out in day-to-day life throughout the year. We read in David’s great prayer of repentance in Psalm 51 that the key to true victory is  a “willing spirit to sustain me.” It doesn’t take much to begin something or to make a promise of a new start. It is the sustaining power of the Holy Spirit in that promise that effects true, lifelong change. The proof is in the next year, or the next 30 years.  

As we celebrate the 30th anniversary of SSCA’s existence, I am often asked to reflect on that first summer of 1994. I tell people that it was exhilarating and exhausting. I witnessed incredible acts of personal sacrifice: bank accounts were emptied, credit cards were maxed out, vacations were spent cleaning and painting rooms, and there were times when we had to ask people to go without a paycheck so we could pay other bills. There are faces and families I will never forget because when something is forged from nothing, it burns into your soul.

But I want to take a moment to thank the “sustaining” people. Faculty who bought into the mission in later years.  Families who came and sacrificed after founding families had left. Board members who worked tirelessly on a mission that others had started. Donors who kept the school going when we were struggling to make our budget. In many ways, these “sustainers” are more important, more impressive, than the ones in the startup years, because it’s one thing to have an idea, a spark, or a renewal. It’s another thing to keep it going. 

On a personal level, I want to thank those who continue to underwrite SSCA with their gifts. The lives you have impacted, including my own four children who went from PreK to 12th grade, are now bearing fruit in the South Shore. This could not have happened without the “sustainers,” the people who continue to give each year to keep this incredible ministry going, and I believe that there are still countless families that need SSCA for their own children, for this year and for years to come. 

Tom Dagley

Founder, Alumni Parent, Teacher