Faith Academy Trivia:

Q. What are Faith Academy’s school colors?

A. Blue & Yellow would have been an incorrect answer on March 19 of this year. 

Red & White flooded the Circle as we began the day with an all-school gathering at the flagpole to kick off our

• A Red & White dress code for staff and students.
• A Red & White “25 Years of Service” banner hanging in front of the HS Office with a very fresh set of dorm parents smiling back at you.
• A Red & White clad Tom and Wendy, with Uncle Tom wearing a brand-new red & white striped shirt that was a gift from his dormies.
• A Red & White banner with the day’s theme “At Home with the Ballentyne’s” parading in front of a horn-blaring, dormie-filled jeepney.
• A string of Red paper dolls representing the 201 Ballentyne dormies from the past 25 years.
• A Red & White Canadian flag being raised and flying over our campus.
• With a Red & White Canadian flag tie, Tom Hardeman, our Head of School, praying over Tom and Wendy and praising the Lord for their commitment and His goodness that has made these 25 years a reality.

After school, and after an all-dorm hot lunch in the Circle, faculty, staff, dormies, mission representatives, and members of Tom and Wendy’s family gathered in a Red & White-decorated Tipunan Hall for the “At Home with the Ballentyne’s” merienda and program.  Tom and Wendy sat on their own living room furniture that had been transported to the stage and shared stories of their years in the dorm – the joys and the struggles of being stand-in parents for 201 kids.  Laughter and a few tears accompanied a presentation of photographs and the reading of letters of appreciation and thankfulness from current and former dormies and Faith staff that had been shared on a special Facebook group.  As we ate Aunt Wendy’s samosas and Uncle Tom’s favorite oatmeal cookies, the Bunting dorm boys returned the 25 items that they stole during a dorm raid including a roll of toilet paper, Uncle Tom’s house slippers, earphones, and more.  Lori French went on to MC a runway show of Aunt Wendy’s costume creations that have only increased in extravagance over the years.  Their own dormies premiered a brilliant humorous video they shot and edited of a day in the life of Ballentyne dormie. 

The red and the white that had ruled the day paled in the face of the memories shared, of thanks given, of congratulations and commendation pronounced, of prayers lifted up.  And, in the midst of it all, more powerful than those red & white colors, the constant and repeated refrain from Tom and Wendy that it has been a joy and a blessing to serve God by serving the boarding needs of Faith Academy families.

Written by Becca Van Weerdhuizen - Staff member and Class of 1999