History:

The services that would eventually be offered at Dorothy Sayers Classical School began in 1990 when the founder and director, Mrs. Sandra Lawson began home schooling her two younger children after becoming discontented with her children’s schools.  Both of the children were attending private schools: a traditional Christian school and a school for dyslexic children.  After a while, she and her husband decided it best to withdraw their children.  They made a great sacrifice to pay the pricy tuition on a budget that was already overloaded with serious medical debt and felt that the education being offered to their children was not of the standard expected for such a sacrifice.

As the Lawson’s began to search for a new school, they met several home schooling families.  This seemed to be a viable alternative and Mrs. Lawson began home schooling one child in January of 1989.  While researching educational pedagogy and curricula Mrs. Lawson was introduced to classical methodology, and she slowly began to implement the classical approach into her child’s studies of literature, composition and history.  Mrs. Lawson loved home schooling but had one major problem; it took her five times longer to prepare to teach than to actually teach a subject.  This was especially true with Latin.

In May Mrs. Lawson received the test results for her learning disabled child.  After four years of special classes the child was showing almost no gain, only scoring first grade, second month in reading.  Soon after, Mrs. Lawson happened upon a talk radio program originating from Texas and heard a father tell about the success of his learning disabled son, as well as 70% of his classmates. After using an explicit phonic program for only one year the students had achieved an average reading score.  She immediately sent off for the materials and began to home school her other child.  Nine months later the child tested at fifth grade, eighth month.  She and her husband were delighted at their son’s progress.  This son went on to receive a master degree from Southern Seminary. 

Mrs. Lawson wanted to learn more and decided to host a training seminar. Unable to meet the required number of attendees to pay the trainer, the seminar had to be canceled.  However through this effort she met a woman who had home schooled her two sons for one year and taught them Latin. Mrs. Lawson contacted her about tutoring a Latin class for home schooled children and she agreed.  Mrs. Lawson handled all the logistics and secured classroom space in her church.  The first class began in January of 1991 with about 25 students. 

As the semester went by the benefits of this type of education became clear to Mrs. Lawson  She liked the fact that her children were not away from home nine hours a day, five days a week and that they were being fully engaged in the subjects being taught in the classroom, while at the same time, Mrs. Lawson was not burdened with the responsibility of preparing to teach a subject – the tutor set the standards and gave all of the tests, and her job was simply to make sure her children came to class prepared. 

Soon, Mrs. Lawson was approaching other mothers to see if they would be interested in other subjects being presented by a tutor.  The tutoring sessions were offered to students in grades 5 – 12.  Parents requested help in teaching Latin, math and science. Soon Mrs. Lawson, along with some help from a friend, was busy making all of the arrangements for nearly 75 students to begin receiving tutoring at what had begun to be called “the cottage school.” 

Over the next several years “the cottage school” grew, moved twice, winding up back at the first location, Mrs. Lawson’s church.  The name had changed several times as Mrs. Lawson tried to find the school’s identity both in purpose and name.  For a time it was called “The Resource Center” and then for even a shorter period of time it was called, “Mater Studiorium,” Latin for our mother of enthusiastic learning.  The students rejected that one very quickly! 

In 1994 Mrs. Lawson suggested naming the little gathering of students, Dorothy Sayers Cottage School, since it was Sayers’ essay, The Lost Tools of Learning, that had been pivotal in starting the tutoring classes in the first place and “school” literally means, “A building where young people receive education.”  This name would best describe the pedagogy used in the tutoring service and the word school certainly expressed Mrs. Lawson’s convictions of teaching her children.  Learning was to happen everywhere, and at all times and most especially at home.

During this time of growth it became evident that there were many parents at a loss of what to do with their struggling student.  Parents would enroll with the hope that since their student did not like five day a week school perhaps they would perform better in a program that offered tutoring once or twice a week.  This presented another problem for the parent; overseeing a student who does not want to complete the homework requirement for each subject of at least one hour per day, plus additional study time for tests.

In return, this presented a problem for the tutors.  Since tutor instruction and class time is from 70 minutes to three hours per week, students coming to class unprepared prevented the class from progressing through a rigorous subject at an advanced pace.  It became evident that DSCS was putting an excessive amount of time into managing a program for students in grades 5-12 that was not producing the desired results.  These situations prompted some changes in enrollment.  Parents and students had to commit to the rigorous structure of the studies by completing the work on time and maintaining passing grades.  If a student was unable to succeed in the program the parents agreed to remove the student without reimbursement or release from financial agreement and find a suitable learning environment that would meet the needs of their student. 

With these changes the outreach to families needing help with books, curriculum and math placement testing increased.  From that time forward the commitment to help meet the needs of those not entering the program has helped to ease the stress for parents trying to make some difficult educational decisions.    

At the same time a program for grades K – 4 (See Grammar Level Classes) was developed.  The decision was made to offer a program for students to receive classroom instruction in all core subjects.  Students attended class 4 ½ hours, two days a week.  They returned home with very detailed lessons plans for the parent to teach and ready the child for the next class time.  This proved to be very successful and from this success, with the encouragement of a parent council, Mrs. Lawson moved forward in making the needed changes in the middle school program.  All the while the changes being made were to move the curriculum toward a more purely classical approach to education.

In 1999, students enrolling in grades 5-8 (See Logic Level Classes) were required to take a prescribed course of study that includes Latin, literature, composition, history, geography, math, science and logic.  Changes in the high school program (rhetoric level classes) were also implemented.  At the rhetoric level parents are looking for help with upper level classes as well as help in meeting all of the requirements of high school level courses in preparation for college. Students enrolled in grades 9 – 12 (Rhetoric level classes) are required to take a prescribed course of study.

Monitored study halls are provided. As in the lower grades, detailed lesson plans are sent home and the students are required to complete the work and turn it in on time or lose 25% of their grade.  Lesson plans for the Logic Level classes begin to direct the instruction to the students with the goal in mind of teaching the student to be self motivated and become an independent learner.  Lesson plans for the Rhetoric level classes are written to the student and very little, if any, parent instruction is needed.  Students must take in-class tests and quizzes on time or lose 25% of the test grade. Promotion is determined solely by in-class tests and quizzes. Students are required to dress according to the uniform code. These requirements help us to maintain and attract families seeking to provide a more rigorous education for their children. 

Today, as in the past, DSCS offers tutoring services for the home educated student.  A rigorous classical curriculum is adhered to.  The grading scale has a seven point spread.  Promotion is still based solely upon on campus, tutor proctored, tests and quiz scores.  Math and Latin require an eighty percent test and quiz score for promotion.  Students in grades 5-8 complete two years of high school Latin.  Tutors for grades 5 – 12 have obtained or are in the process of obtaining master and doctorate level degrees.  Tutors for grades K-4 are, with few exceptions, degreed and in all cases are fully trained to teach classically.

Throughout DSCS’s history the goal has been to offer an exceptional classical education at the lowest cost possible to parents willing to assist in the tutor directed education of their children.  The parents provide guidance, over site, and educational instruction at home as prescribed by the course work of the DSCS tutors.  The average cost per student is $2000.00 per year.  This includes most of the materials, including paper for kindergarten through fourth grade.

DSCS desires to serve one income families where a parent is home to facilitate the education of the children, which requires DSCS to work very hard at holding expenses to a minimum.  Renting classroom space from churches has helped us to meet this goal.  As another mechanism to facilitate the education of children in needy families the Board of Directors of Hearts at Home, Inc. may waive or reduce certain administrative fees and or book fees.

DSCS has always rented space from local churches and for various reasons, (i.e. church growth, a change in the mission of the church, etc.) the need to find a new location can occur.  The service remained at the first location for seven years.  Moving twice the first six weeks of classes in 2001, DSCS remained in the second location until September 2003.  Total enrollment is held to about 250 students and the move in September 2003 required the services to be housed in two separate locations.  In 2007 grades K-4 were moved to a new location.  Beginning with this academic year (2008-09) grades 5 – 12 moved to the same location as grades K-4.  This location, Hopewell Baptist Church, has proven to be a good fit for both the church and the school and provides an established location until a permanent building is secured.  

When this work began Mrs. Lawson’s goal was to help the home schooling family while helping her own children by providing tutors to instruct the individual subjects.  Now, seventeen years later, DSCS is recognized as one of the premier schools in the region.