Bringing Hope to Urban Communities | Josh Dyson

On this episode of Anchored, Soren is joined by Josh Dyson, the Executive Director of the C5 Urban School Initiative, launching Hope Academy Wichita this coming fall. They discuss the founding of C5, the meaning behind its name, and its mission in serving inner-city communities. They conclude by exploring literacy as a core educational value and the importance of creating a safe, joyful learning environment.

Transcript

Soren Schwab - CLT (00:00.905)
Welcome back to the Anchored Podcast, the official podcast of the Classic Learning Test. My name is Soren Schwab, VP of Partnerships here at CLT, and today we're joined by Josh Dyson. Josh has most recently served as the headmaster at the Classical School of Wichita in Wichita, Kansas. In December 2024, he launched, under God's guidance, to start the C5 Urban School Initiative, for which he serves as the executive director. C5 will launch Hope Academy Wichita this coming fall. Additionally,

Josh serves on the board of our very own classic learning test as a an academic advisor and also on the board of as an orate fellow for the Society for classical learning He and his wife Julie have been married since 2006 and they have four children Deacon Noel Daisy and Lucy and I'm so excited to have him on the podcast today Josh. Welcome

Josh Dyson (00:51.052)
Great to be with you, my friend.

Soren Schwab - CLT (00:52.715)
Honestly, it's like I haven't talked to Josh in a long long time. Let's get him on the podcast so we can catch up No, that's part of the reason but it's also you're doing incredible things and we're gonna get to see five Hope Academy Wichita really life-changing things you're doing But let's start as we always do on the anchor podcast by talking about our guests own educational background Now tell us a little bit about your your k-12 experience where you were you public school educated homeschool private. What was like?

Josh Dyson (01:18.338)
Yeah, I got it all. I did the whole thing. Started out homeschool, ended up going to a private school, you know, about 40, 50 kids in my class for eighth and ninth grade, Lutheran School in Houston. And then finished up at a giant public school, graduated with 830 kids in Deer Park, Texas. Yeah, so did the whole thing.

Soren Schwab - CLT (01:21.09)
You

Soren Schwab - CLT (01:32.04)
Uh-uh.

Soren Schwab - CLT (01:41.157)
Wow. Wow. Wow, that was still in that was still in Texas. Did you did you go into higher ed? Like I'm going to pursue education or or was that journey journey like kind of into education?

Josh Dyson (01:54.51)
Yeah, pretty early on, I felt a call to be involved in ministry. So when I was in high school, even thought that that was a direction that I was going to be going was toward ministry. And a lot of people affirm that, spend a little bit of time overseas in Costa Rica, doing some work there, and then ended up at Houston. Houston Baptist University is the school I went to. It's now called Houston Christian University.

Soren Schwab - CLT (02:19.007)
Yeah. All right.

Josh Dyson (02:21.166)
So did, you know, biblical languages and Christianity was my undergraduate there. Ended up being a minister at my church, a youth minister, and did some adult ministry during that time before then heading on to seminary at, you know, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. So spent a couple years there. And then, you know, was really when I was in Louisville that was torn between academics and church.

ministry. So that's kind of the short version of how we got to that point.

Soren Schwab - CLT (02:56.063)
Yeah, yeah. When did you when did you first kind of tap into into school administration? Was that before Wichita? Was that when you came to classical school Wichita?

Josh Dyson (03:04.813)
Yeah, so I ended up after, you know, when I was in Louisville, we ended up moving back to Houston. My son was born, so I wasn't able to finish my degree there at Southern. And I took a job at Houston's First Baptist Academy. So it's the First Baptist Houston at their Pre-K through 8 school as a chaplain and I taught Bible there. So it was mostly, you know,

Soren Schwab - CLT (03:22.827)
Mm-hmm.

Josh Dyson (03:34.734)
doing teaching and really fell in love with teaching at that point. I fell in love with Christian education at that school, especially for children who were in that middle school age. Before that, I just thought that college, higher ed was the way to go. But being able to spend time with those sixth graders, seventh graders, eighth graders, I saw what a tremendous opportunity for life change that we have with these kids.

So through that time, know, and doing chaplain work and then somehow ended up doing trip planning for First Madams Academy planned, you know, our local trip to San Antonio and Austin for seventh graders, then ended up planning the eighth grade tour of New York, D.C., Philadelphia. And oddly enough, it was through trip planning that I...

found my knack for administration and was like, this is actually what I love doing. And that was the beginning of the administrative journey.

Soren Schwab - CLT (04:38.315)
Wow, wow, is fascinating. It's your trip planning, huh? I think it takes someone with a, yeah, just a heart for middle school kids. A number of times I interviewed right out of college, wanted to go into teaching, and the number of times people said anything but middle school. But then every now and then you got the ones that said, I would love to teach junior high or middle school. There's only two types of people in the world, I think, and you were the one that embraced that.

Josh Dyson (04:41.549)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (04:59.949)
Yeah.

Right.

Yeah. Well, you're hired. Yeah. It's not what I was saying when I went into the, to the role. it was a little bit more of a, all right, well, I guess I'll try this out. but it, you know, it kind of grew on me over time and had to catch the vision for it.

Soren Schwab - CLT (05:07.667)
Yeah.

I'm sure.

Soren Schwab - CLT (05:15.987)
Right.

Soren Schwab - CLT (05:20.969)
Right, yeah, especially now when you're going to, you know, the Hillsdale, the Grove cities and to recruit teachers, like 99 % of them want to teach, you know, senior class literature and philosophy. Well, let's back off a little bit. When was the first, I guess, Houston, first Baptist, not a classical school, Christian school, not a classical school. When were you first exposed to and kind of then got immersed into classical education?

Josh Dyson (05:31.532)
Yeah, exactly.

Josh Dyson (05:41.528)
No? Yep.

Josh Dyson (05:49.294)
Yeah, I when I was in Louisville, was some, you know, exposure there through Highlands Latin. I was never, you know, at Highlands, but had friends who were very involved there. So, piqued my interest during that time. And then when I was at First Baptist Academy, again, fell in love with Christian education, but really desired for something more. Wasn't sure what that was at the time. Ended up

Soren Schwab - CLT (05:53.247)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (06:15.054)
And a lot of some people may or may not know Dr. Rodney Marshall, who started Coram Deo there in Dallas, Flower Mound, a number of years ago. So Rodney Marshall ended up being the interim head of school at our school, First Baptist Academy. So we had pretty much the full year that he was there. And he really took me under his wings.

And of course, you know, being a founder of a classical school, he's a wealth of knowledge, very well connected. And then he sent me and my principal or middle school principal to the Society for Classical Learning Conference in 2013 in San Antonio. you know, whenever, you know, hearing James K. Smith and Louis Marcos, you know, present their talks and I mean, I was hooked at that point.

Soren Schwab - CLT (07:11.357)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (07:11.822)
This is where I want to be.

Soren Schwab - CLT (07:15.915)
That is, yeah, it's hard when you hear Louis Marcos not to get hugged.

Josh Dyson (07:20.494)
Yeah. And then, then Rodney encouraged me to get, go back and get some education to get in, you know, in the classical world. So I went back to Houston Baptist, started working on Masters of Liberal Arts there. So it was in that program for a little while while was still at First Baptist Academy. And then there became friends with Neil Anderson. know a lot of people know Neil down in Houston. So yeah, we hit it off and then

Soren Schwab - CLT (07:44.479)
Yep.

Josh Dyson (07:49.868)
Yeah, from there, connection to connection, ended up in administration at a class of Christian school.

Soren Schwab - CLT (07:56.533)
think the first time I talked to you on the phone, you were still the COO, think, of, I that was your official title, right, at Wichita before you became headmaster or director of operations. There you go. Yeah, not quite the C-suite yet. That's fine. But yeah, no, I do remember that, like, vividly pacing around the table, because I think it was my first year at CLT. Still a little nervous. Phone call. It went pretty well. You guys signed up eventually.

Josh Dyson (08:03.704)
Director of Operations is what we called it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Josh Dyson (08:17.261)
Yeah.

Yeah, Yeah, we're excited. Yeah, yeah, Director of Operations there for four years at classical school under, Wade Ortego was the head of school at that time, he's at Ambrose now. And then when Wade took off, then, yeah, I assume the head of school role did that for almost seven years.

Soren Schwab - CLT (08:29.685)
Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (08:37.855)
man, that, yeah, it's a fantastic school and what you've built there and continued obviously. Just great people. One of our good friends, Kevin Thames, he's really become a close friend. Just an incredible school, growing it, scaling it. But what I always love about schools that you grow and scale, not losing sight of their mission, right? And not.

you know, no mission drift, in fact doubling down through COVID. So it's been really beautiful to see. I was, yeah, of course.

Josh Dyson (09:07.328)
I'm to interrupt you real quick. that story about being sent to San Antonio, the SCL. Kevin was the other person that was sent, that Rodney sent me and Kevin together to SCL because Kevin was my middle school principal at that time. And then when I moved to classical school, Wichita, I ended up recruiting Kevin to come to Wichita to spend, you know, was there for the next 10 years with us. So sorry to interrupt, but it, you know, fun.

Soren Schwab - CLT (09:12.105)
Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (09:19.701)
no way.

Soren Schwab - CLT (09:23.307)
It's so fun.

Soren Schwab - CLT (09:30.699)
Wow, incredible. No, no, that is, that is, yeah, when it comes to pens and backpipes, know, Kevin Thames is the man you need to, you need to know. Lots of things. Yeah. That's the thing about the classical. There's so many really, really interesting human beings, you know? And so.

Josh Dyson (09:36.397)
Thank you.

Josh Dyson (09:39.934)
Lots of things. He's the man to me.

Soren Schwab - CLT (09:49.483)
A few months ago, I got a text from you and you said that you're going to move on from classical school of Wichita and there's a transition plan in place and all that. And you're going to start something new. And that's what I want to talk to you about today. You are the executive director of the C5 Urban School Initiative. Tell our audience, know what I mean, obviously, I'm sure it was a lot of prayers, a lot of conversations with your family, but you're leaving.

you know, good role at classical school of Wichita, right, to start something completely new. So what led you to that? And then of course, tell us C5, what does that stand for? What's the vision and mission of the organization?

Josh Dyson (10:24.088)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (10:31.554)
Yeah, as schools continue to grow, and a number of us are in schools that are in moments of significant growth and really trying to understand what does that mean for our school and for our leadership and those things. And that puts, I think, us as leaders into some more spaces of asking those questions. Who's God calling me to be? Where is God calling me to be? Where do I fit into this environment?

Soren Schwab - CLT (10:39.775)
Mm-hmm.

Josh Dyson (11:00.206)
So, you know, about a little over a year ago, I really started, dove into that time of discernment and really just went before the Lord asking big questions like, is it that you want for me? What is it you want from my family? What you're calling upon my life? And, you know, I think sometimes, you know, we ask, you know, God to, hey, you know, have a couple options for you. You know, you kind of lean, which way do you lean toward?

But really try to go before God and just completely open posture and say, hey, all right, I just want to open up space completely to you. Whatever you want, God, that's where we want to be. And the big question that I asked through that time was, God, what is your heart for our city? And we sensed that his response was, all right, well, for one, Josh, it's about time you asked what my heart is and what my desire is.

Soren Schwab - CLT (11:54.549)
Hahaha

Josh Dyson (11:58.614)
And then secondly is, you know, my heart is the same that it's always been and is throughout all scripture very clear, you know, that he has a heart for the poor and for the forgotten and the lonely and the fatherless and orphan, the widow. So when we heard, you know, God say that, we're like, okay, well, let's do it. Let's figure out what does it mean to be able to serve those people.

And what is it that God has given us? He's given us a beautiful education. And I've really come to see that in our culture, you know, especially the poor, they have so many needs that are met. Food, shelter, mental health services, all kinds of things. So we're trying, what is it that's not met? What is the bread, so to speak, of our day and our culture? Education is the bread.

That is the thing that the poor still don't have access to really rich, high quality, excellent education. mean, if you start looking at the statistics around literacy in particular, it really is tragic. And what that means for the future of kids who are not able to actually read in a meaningful way. yeah, it's like, say, all right, guys, let's

Let's go after this and see what that means. So that's how, you know, it's a short story.

Soren Schwab - CLT (13:32.555)
Wow, that is amazing. And from that to, you you could have probably tacked on to a ministry, right? Or, but then to say, you know what, I'm gonna start something new that does not exist in its current form. So tell me C5, kind of the name, what does it stand for? And what led you to kind of that name and maybe kind of the mission and vision of the organization itself.

Josh Dyson (13:39.544)
Yep.

Josh Dyson (13:44.035)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (13:59.5)
Yeah, yeah, so how we ended up, you know, a C5 is these five C's and the five C's of C5 are classical, Christian, in the church, in the community being served for the Great Commission. So what we, you know, want to see is those five things where they intersect and where they come together. So yeah, that's how we ended up with a name, not necessarily the most creative of names. It's just like, here's five things.

Soren Schwab - CLT (14:26.891)
like it.

Josh Dyson (14:27.726)
So, C5 is where we ended up.

Soren Schwab - CLT (14:31.625)
Yeah, I kind of figured because you hear the sometimes the three C's, know, we're collaborative Christian, but C5 and it's probably going to lead to a lot of questions, right? What does that stand for? Glad you asked, you know. So so in classical Christian, you know, a lot of our listeners probably get that for the Great Commission. I love that. Go out there in the church that is

Josh Dyson (14:41.664)
Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (14:56.341)
There are obviously some classical Christian schools that are, but many are not. So what was kind of the thinking behind that?

Josh Dyson (15:02.862)
Yeah, you know, I chose to, you know, even in this fall, we were in the nave of our church, Incarnation Anglican Church. That's a little shout out there. And this is where our first school will be held. So Hope Academy will meet here starting in the fall of Incarnation. You know, as we continue to wrestle with this, and it's so encouraging to see various people wrestling with us, me even right, you know, I think today or tomorrow, Alcuin,

Soren Schwab - CLT (15:05.645)
I... yes.

Soren Schwab - CLT (15:13.535)
Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (15:30.827)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (15:32.526)
fellows are gathering to wrestle with this very question. Because so many of our schools are independent and essentially operate as parachurch ministries are not connected to, or not ministries maybe at all. But historically the church has been the one that really has been the pioneer of education, has paved the way

Soren Schwab - CLT (15:36.821)
You

Josh Dyson (15:58.862)
especially for what we now call public education. I the church was the one who led that, right? And up until, you know, 100, 150 years ago, that's where those schools existed. Nobody would have considered educating, especially the poor, until the church came along to do that. So, you know, lot of what we want to do is there are some entities that have maintained this. I the Catholic Church has done a fairly good job of seeking to

can hold onto that calling of education. The Lutherans have done a fairly good job of trying to hold on to that. But by and large, a lot of evangelical churches have not held on to, especially K-12 education being a priority. And so we want to do this, this call back, like, the church, historically, this is the space that the church has been in. There would be no public schools if it was not the church.

that stepped into their neighborhoods to educate these children. So a lot of it is a calling back of the church to that role. There's also, especially in the work that we're seeking to do, which is inner city impoverished communities, there's ways that we really need the church, probably, maybe more radically than others do. The church leaders are still respected.

Soren Schwab - CLT (17:04.863)
Mm-hmm.

Josh Dyson (17:21.934)
And a lot of these communities are very involved in reaching the needs of families in these communities. Like, can we partner together with you in some of these things? But maybe the most significant of all is the spiritual side of all this. You know, especially as we look at, you know, if we understand what's happening in our culture to be a spiritual battle.

Then education is one of those fronts the battle is taking place on. And if we're going to enter into dark places, places that there are strongholds there in place, then we need a spiritual power. And, you know, I believe that Jesus Christ gave, you know, promise to the church whenever He said, you know, upon this rock, I'll build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

That's the promise that we need if we're gonna be charging into dark places, which is what we intend to do. We intend to go into dark places, and I don't wanna do that alone. So it's like, all right, church, we need you to step up into that spiritual role and the promise the gates of hell will not prevail against.

Soren Schwab - CLT (18:23.626)
Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (18:35.595)
I love that. love that. I for our regular listeners, just I don't know how many weeks ago, just a couple of weeks ago, maybe I had Sarah Osborne on the podcast from College of the Ozarks. And we talked a lot about is classical education for all. I mean, we're in this next phase of growth of classical schools. And she talked more about students with disabilities or, you know, reading challenges. And we're obviously a local centric movement. Right. And so and she was

you know, saying that there's some work we can do. And when I'm thinking about, you know, what you're doing, there are not a lot of classical Christian schools that go into the inner city. you know, and those are are great schools. for a long time, they had to establish themselves. The reputation is right. And it's probably a little bit unfair, right, that those classical Christian schools, they're only kind of in the suburbs with a

Upper middle class white families live and we know that's not entirely true And of course you have your classical charter schools that are oftentimes in those at least bringing that aspect of classical I think the one school that oftentimes we point to in a classical Christian school that does it is Hope Academy in in the Twin Cities and Russ Greg So I have to ask right Hope Academy Wichita Hope okay Is there a connection and and was was kind of sure Russ is a friend of yours, you know

Was there kind of a model that you wanted to copy, to speak?

Josh Dyson (20:01.538)
Yeah, has played a tremendous role in our discernment. So I've had a number of calls with Russ and texts at times, know, some of those like, am I crazy? You know, phone calls. Yeah. He's like, yes, you are. Yeah. Yeah. It was actually in a visit to Minneapolis and Russ let us, know,

Soren Schwab - CLT (20:13.963)
Yes, keep going.

Josh Dyson (20:26.734)
and I'm going to stay a couple nights in his home while we spend a couple days there at Hope Academy doing their Hope plunge. I put a plug in for that for anybody that's interested in this work is go spend a couple days doing the Hope plunge. So it's through that time that really sealed the deal, so to speak, for me that this is what I need to go do.

Soren Schwab - CLT (20:33.802)
Yep.

Josh Dyson (20:52.596)
And what's really cool about, what they're doing in Minneapolis is unbelievable. 650 kids being served in the inner city of Minneapolis. But more than that is they are actively helping a number of schools get going and supporting and networking. It's called the Spreading Hope Network.

Soren Schwab - CLT (21:16.863)
Thank you.

Josh Dyson (21:17.134)
And I'm not sure exactly what our title is, if member or affiliate is with Spreading Hope, but we are definitely very much in that, in simply working with them through all that.

Soren Schwab - CLT (21:31.145)
Yeah, yeah. Is it going to look different, right? When you think about, you know, we're bringing classical Christian education to a community that has probably not heard of classical Christian, might not respond to it in the way, again, other populations might. I'm assuming going to inner city, it's going to be poorer families. I would assume.

Josh Dyson (21:36.365)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (21:44.974)
Thank

Soren Schwab - CLT (21:58.123)
higher minority population than probably in the suburbs. So one, obviously you're bringing that to those families. What has the reception been so far? And what's kind of the, you know, the quote I'm a marketing guy, the marketing, the messaging that you're approaching? Because my assumption is talking about you're to read Aristotle is probably not going to immediately persuade people.

Josh Dyson (22:21.878)
Yeah, yeah, those are great questions and I can break that into quite a number of different questions there. Yeah, thinking about the messaging is a big one, right? There is some baggage associated with the term classical, which is not always received the best, especially in some minority populations. So we've tried to navigate through that. There are some schools that have abandoned the term classical altogether.

Soren Schwab - CLT (22:38.4)
Mm-hmm.

Josh Dyson (22:53.045)
Not necessarily, but maybe that could be the right decision in their context. We haven't made that decision at this point, but it's not really our leading. We don't lead with that side of things. You know, I try to think of some other creative language that may be like so rich education is one that I've tried to lean into or just excellence. You know, excellent education has been one that we tried to lean into.

Soren Schwab - CLT (23:02.303)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (23:21.87)
You know, largely, you know, also, you know, our leading thing has, you know, it's not Aristotle, those kind of things. At this moment, it really is literacy. And, of course, we're starting at a younger population where literacy is key for them, right? If by third grade, they're not reading on level, the implications of that are tragic.

Soren Schwab - CLT (23:31.072)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (23:45.038)
So that's largely what we're selling on right now is hey, art so like in art where we're zoned right now so in incarnation Anglican Church the neighborhood that we're in right now which is a low-income neighborhood This where the kids that are zoned to the local elementary school, right? It's less it's twelve point one percent of third graders that are reading a proficient level Twelve point one percent right at proficient level proficient level is the level at which you know say if you're reading this level Then you should be able to you know make it in college

Soren Schwab - CLT (24:05.003)
12.1 %

Josh Dyson (24:15.342)
So which even which even more tragic than that is for African-American children and their zone to this school in fourth grade It's less than five percent that are reading at a proficient level. I mean one in twenty of those kids I mean Like it or not our our culture even even with all the you know screens and all the technology that kind of Literacy is still

We're still very much a literacy culture and if you don't have literacy, you're not going to make it. And there are exceptions to that, of course, and there are whole cultures that are not, you know, literacy cultures and, you know, that's great. They're more oral cultures and that's wonderful. I'm not talking about those cultures. We're talking about the American culture that we're in right now. Very much is a literacy-based culture. So that's largely how we've really focused on that. we're...

We're putting kind of all our eggs in the basket of saying, let's, we want to demonstrate to you that we can get our, all of our students up, you know, a hundred percent students are reading at a proficient level. And then we hope through that to be able to start building trust with those families to say, hey, we kind of help, you you walked with us, we walked with you through this process. Will you continue to walk with us as we start to explore, right? And when we think about literacy, maybe there's some ideas of what that means for jobs and those kinds of things.

But we us as we want to help to open up a world of the classical tradition and virtue formation and what's true, good and beautiful. As we've leaned heavily on the W.E.B. Du Bois quote, it's just the end of education is not to make men into carpenters, but to make carpenters into men. You do have one. Yeah, I have it somewhere. Yeah. I think that's what Neutrol is like. I love that one. I'm going to make that a...

Soren Schwab - CLT (25:56.256)
Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (26:00.491)
I think we have sealed to bookmarks with that quote. It's one of my yeah, nice. It's one of my it's one of my Hey, we didn't come up I mean the design maybe but no that's that's that's amazing Yeah, I read on your on your website and it really I mean it It resonated with me. I was in a you charter school and it was you know Lottery enrollment. So we had we had yeah, we had students

wealthier families and we had students from the trailer park down the street and A lot of them sure came for the classical piece of it But the number of families that I talked to that we talked to that just said I want my child to feel safe When they're at school right to be and I read that on your website, know kind of your commitment your child will be I think it's a safe and joyous learning environment I think that coupled with

Josh Dyson (26:45.39)
Yes.

Josh Dyson (26:50.274)
Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (26:58.055)
your child will be loved on, right? We will love your child. I mean, it seems so quote unquote simple, right? But it's just probably not their experience whatsoever. it's amazing.

Josh Dyson (26:59.992)
Mm-hmm.

Josh Dyson (27:09.07)
Yeah, I a lot of these kids, mean unfortunately, you know, we, you know, of course it's easy for me to think of safety and I think of things like, you know, safe spaces and those kind of stuff. But we're talking about population where it may literally be physical safety that they're, that we're talking about, right? I mean, it's really unbelievable what a number of these students experience on a daily basis or weekly basis that would, that, or at least for myself, I can only speak for myself.

are so far outside of what my experience has been.

Soren Schwab - CLT (27:43.071)
Yeah, yeah, no, we're not talking. I disagree with what you said. I need my safe space. We're talking, I mean, there's, yeah, we're physically feeling like we're not safe. yeah, no, that commitment is important and I'm sure it's gonna resonate with those families. What about cost, right? mean, private Christian schools, usually cost is the major factor. Now you're taking that to lower income families. How are you navigating that?

Josh Dyson (27:50.156)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (28:08.654)
Yeah, yeah, it's, I went to Minneapolis, you know, to see Russ at Hope Academy, one of the questions he asked me, I'm probably maybe stealing Russ's little tagline here, so sorry Russ, if you can't use this anymore. But, you know, I was sitting there in his office and he asked me, said, whenever you came, you know, you're looking at options to get, you know, up to Minneapolis.

Uh, did you say, did you look at, you, did you, uh, quote some, you know, charter jets and you quote, you know, you know, leasing a private jet to get up here. Um, I was like, that's, that's ridiculous. Of course I didn't look at a private jet, uh, but I just got on Expedia or whatever United, you know, and found the cheapest thing that, that I could find. And he said, and that said, that's exactly what you got, know, people that are in these lower income.

Soren Schwab - CLT (28:57.088)
Right.

Josh Dyson (29:06.519)
When you start talking about private school, you might as well be talking about chartering a jet to get somewhere, right? I that's not what you do. So yeah, it's a huge thing to even get into the thinking like that this is something to consider, and how are we gonna do that? So we largely will follow the model that the hope Minneapolis has set.

by erratically subsidizing that through sponsorships, through donors. We have a tax credit program here in Kansas that we're hoping to take advantage of. And then Lord willing, we think in a couple years that we'll have education savings accounts here in Kansas. So what we're trying to do is get set up, now get the infrastructure in place and something that can be replicated in place so that when that hits, there'll be fuel on the fire.

Soren Schwab - CLT (29:41.333)
Hmm.

Josh Dyson (30:01.838)
There's a lot of the criticism of ESAs or any school choice thing is that only, you know, a certain demographic is benefiting from those. So, you know, if one's like, all right, well, let's, we'll address that by, you know, prioritizing, you know, a low income demographic. And then of course, another issue with the school choice, what's happening with school choice is the number, is the schools, if there's no schools available, then it doesn't matter how much money you have to go spend in the school.

Soren Schwab - CLT (30:09.419)
you

Soren Schwab - CLT (30:27.627)
That's right.

Josh Dyson (30:29.518)
So it's like, all right, well, let's address that need by creating schools and a network of schools that can be intentionally replicated to meet an influx of students whenever those things happen. yeah, so that's what our dream is.

Soren Schwab - CLT (30:41.183)
How exciting. Yeah, and I know from several of the ESA legislation that was passed, especially the rollout the first year, it's going to mostly be for lower income families. And so it's not even like you'd have to wait. You'd have something established already. And I'm sure part of it is just the education, again, of the family, that know that that's something you can use for an already affordable private school in your community. And you don't even have to, you know.

Josh Dyson (31:03.406)
Yes.

Soren Schwab - CLT (31:08.821)
take the bus or go into the suburbs to get that private school education.

Josh Dyson (31:12.642)
Yeah, there's so many interesting things, know, as we've been learning a lot just about poverty, the different ways that people operate differently in impoverished systems are just so different. And we don't realize that, but means most of us are middle class kind of families. assume that most listeners are middle class families. You even talk about the amount of paperwork that it takes to get into a school.

the application process, mean, all, you know, online access and references from, you know, various people, like these, it's just barrier, barrier, barrier, in place. And some of us, I it's good to have, you know, standards and barriers in place, but as we're thinking about, hey, if we're gonna be able to reach a demographic that is very challenged in these things,

We have to get really serious, not just by saying, hey, here's some money available, because a lot of schools do that. But what we've certainly learned is that money is only only as part of the issue. There's a lot of barriers that stand in place. some of those simple as how do you get to the school? Right. Which is part of what our dream is to be able to put a neighborhood school, every neighborhood would have a school with a walking distance so that we can address that issue.

head on and here it is in your neighborhood. And that's where that one sea of in the community, instead of having the posture of, hey, why don't you come to us? We think following the incarnation of our Lord, As we're gonna go, we wanna go to you and take this to the people we wanna serve.

Soren Schwab - CLT (32:52.063)
Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (32:55.493)
I absolutely love that. it sounds like, from the way you're speaking, you're going to start with one this fall with Hope Academy in Wichita, but that's not the end of it. talk to us briefly, kind of, Lord willing, what's kind of the plan the next three to five years? How many schools are you hoping to open?

Josh Dyson (33:04.173)
Yeah.

Josh Dyson (33:13.166)
Yeah, so our Hope Academy, Wichita will be the first one here. We'll start with junior, kinder through third grade, hoping to have somewhere between eight and 15 students. Yes, the model we're using is it doesn't have to be big. We're trying to say, hey, can we get in small, treating, we've high priority on nimbleness, on flexibility, on replicability. And then the year after that, I'm hoping, we're in an active conversation with churches, pastors.

Soren Schwab - CLT (33:23.971)
Awesome.

Josh Dyson (33:42.412)
I say, hey, whenever we get this going, come and see it, right? And then imagine, can you do this in your space? And if you came to our church, it's not a big church. We don't have all the things. We have very limited number of classrooms. We literally don't have a parking lot. But that's part of the vision we're casting is, hey, if we can do it here, you can do it at your church, right? And essentially what I go tell those pastors is,

Soren Schwab - CLT (33:45.994)
Yep.

Soren Schwab - CLT (33:57.707)
Thank

Josh Dyson (34:10.69)
Hey, I know that a lot of you want to do this. A lot of you want to start our schools, but it's still overwhelming to think about all the logistics going into that. So we want to take the logistical side of that and make it actually a fairly simple thing for you to do. It's still going to have a good amount of buy-in required. But can we lower the threshold that churches say, all right, maybe we can do this in partnership with C5.

So we hope to have a couple churches next year that would be willing to let us start expanding into their spaces. And then we want to have around 12 to 13 of these schools in the next five to 10 years, in elementary ages in particular. And then essentially, like a school district operates by having like middle school, maybe they feed into it and then a high school that can serve the whole city. So that's our desire for Wichita.

We want to help those around the nation and even the world. It's been really amazing to see how the Lord has started to open up some opportunities with movements in Asia. And I think that there's some things that we can serve them, but I'm also learning there's a lot that they have to offer us that we can learn about education and being creative and spaces and approaches.

that can help us think outside the box too.

Soren Schwab - CLT (35:39.421)
What an incredible initiative, Josh, other than, of course, our audience's prayers. What are other ways we can support and serve? We'll obviously put the websites in the show notes, but if you want to share with us kind of the website of the initiative and the school and how people could get involved.

Josh Dyson (35:57.326)
Yeah, they go to the website and there's a tab on there, support C5, and it has the pitch deck on there of what our vision is and what our needs are through that, whether it's helping sponsor getting curriculum or teaching resources or help sponsor a child to be able to afford to come here. Our tuition is $9,000 per year at this point. Almost no family.

can afford that who's coming to our school. So we are radically depending upon those who have a heart for this to go into the inner city to help be part of that. So anybody who would love to be part of it would love to talk with them.

Soren Schwab - CLT (36:37.205)
Amazing. Amazing. Well, Josh, we have one final question you told me in the pre kind of the pre chat that we had that that's that's the hardest one for you and you promise that you'd be disciplined. You only pick one book. But the question we always ask at the end of the anchored podcast, if there's one book or one text that has had really a great impact on your life, which one would it be and why?

Josh Dyson (36:46.574)
huh.

Josh Dyson (36:58.658)
Yeah, the one that I, whenever you started to get me thinking about that, Henry Nowen came to mind. And there's a few options that came up. The first Nowen book was the one on the return of the prodigal son, which is I think the first book that I remember weeping while reading it.

you know, the way the heart was really impactful. But most recently, now on, think the book's called In His Name, which is on leadership. you know, Henry, if you know Henry now, you should imagine what he would write about leadership, it's pretty much exactly that. And it's so convicting about, you know, having the right orientation and leadership and posture and humility. Yeah, it really is. It's very short.

Very simple read, but is so rich and good, especially as a leader, highly, highly commend it.

Soren Schwab - CLT (38:02.027)
I, Josh, I am just so in awe at your courage and following the Lord's lead. And I remember the first time talking to Russ Gregg. And I see lot of similarities. just, I can just see the passion and the joy. And I know, of course, Russ, when he talks about the great feast that we spread. I mean, I always get goosebumps thinking about that. And it's just such important work that you're doing. And so.

Josh Dyson (38:23.501)
huh. Yeah.

Soren Schwab - CLT (38:30.857)
Be assured of our prayers. Everyone, please get involved. Learn more about it. Because it doesn't stop in Wichita, right? There's so many communities that need this kind of education. Again, we're here with Josh Dyson, former headmaster of Classical School of Wichita, and now the executive director of the C5 Urban School Initiative, launching Hope Academy Wichita this fall. Josh, it was a pleasure to have you on. Thanks for all you do, my friend.

Josh Dyson (38:56.28)
Thank you, Soren, for having me. It really has been a joy.

Soren Schwab - CLT (39:01.291)
Boom, 39 minutes, hey that was.