Martin White (Class of 2021)
How did our family come to join the Geneva community? When our oldest Martin was two years old, we were talking at the playground with some good neighborhood friends of ours about school options. They were leaving to check out a prestigious school even though the boys were just two. We tagged along and that night we fell in love with The Geneva School. We were captured by the philosophy and curriculum and our only disappointment was that we had to wait until Martin was four to enroll him!
Our family, not unlike many other families in our community, serves in vocational ministry. So Martin, growing up as a pastor’s son, has been consistently exposed to God’s word. As you might imagine, this can bring with it a special challenge: how do we ensure that Martin remains enamored by the beauty of the gospel? This was a question we monitored closely as Martin grew up.
It has been a pleasure to watch Martin grow—not only academically, but also in his spiritual hunger and interest in God’s Word. Geneva is very intentional with each student and I’ve seen this play out time and again in Martin’s life. He’s had so many great teachers pour into him; teachers who recognized and helped develop his strengths while also caring enough to come alongside him to fine-tune his areas of weakness.
One of the best things that I believe the school does in the early years is the end-of-year ceremonies. The teacher speaks a blessing into the life of each child. Some years the blessing takes the form of a written prayer, other years it’s a special award. But in either case, the blessings are personalized and specific to that child’s character. One of the cool things about this is that Martin has had an opportunity to hear from several teachers and coaches over the years that he has the gift of leadership. It has been one of the traits that his teachers have consistently pointed out. This has helped us as parents to encourage this gift and to challenge him to live up to it. Martin’s not numb to spiritual things because the gospel isn’t “sprinkled on” at TGS, it is woven throughout the curriculum so that thinking Christians are produced here. I’m proud of the man that Martin is becoming and thank The Geneva School for the role it has played, and continues to play, in his formation.
Now that Martin is in his senior year, we are gratified to see him taking responsibility for his current school career and also making wise decisions about his future. He balances academics and athletics, as well as his other interests. His relationships, not just with his classmates but also with his teachers, are helping him to define and become the type of man he wants to be. We are excited about the next chapter that God has in store for Martin, and we are confident that Geneva’s fingerprints will be all over it.
