School Context · CPA AI Strategy

Source: calvaryonlineschool.com pages (homepage, About Us, Programs, Staff), April 27, 2026.

This document captures the actual operational and organizational facts about Calvary Preparatory Academy that should ground every recommendation in this packet. It supersedes any general assumptions in the broader research.

The institution

Legal/marketing name: Calvary Preparatory Academy. Internal short form: CPA. Domain: calvaryonlineschool.com.
Founded: 2009 by Jared Beck. Kim Beck was part of the founding and has served on the board since.
Mission framing: “Christ-centered, college prep, online learning.”
Promise to families: Care for the student “mentally, emotionally and spiritually,” personalized learning, academic rigor, accommodations for various needs, clear and timely communication.
Tagline used internally: “Educating the next generation.”

Programs

Program	Grades	Model	Diploma
High School	9–12	Full-time or part-time online	High school diploma granting
Middle / Jr. High	6–8	Full-time or part-time online	Junior high diploma granting
K-5 Mentorship	K–5	One-to-one mentoring, curriculum selection, assessment & records support — not a full online school program; supports homeschooling families	N/A
Summer School	6–12	Flexible accredited college-prep summer classes; multiple enrollment windows	Course credit

Implication for AI strategy: The K-5 program is structurally different — a homeschool-support service rather than a full instructional program. AI integration in K-5 should be designed for the parent/family, not the student directly. The 6-12 program is where the substantive AI integration work belongs.

Accreditation, credentials, reach

WASC (Western Association of Schools & Colleges) accredited, grades 7-12
NCAA approved courses (grades 7-12)
University of California “a-g” approved courses
Students in all 50 states and abroad
Over 400 students currently served (per Kim Beck’s staff bio)
All teachers are California-credentialed

Implication: WASC + UC a-g + NCAA approval creates specific compliance frames around any AI-integrated coursework. New AI-augmented courses or assessments will need to remain a-g compatible and survive WASC re-accreditation review. This is a constraint, not a blocker — both bodies are issuing AI guidance, but it should be part of the design conversation from day one.

Curriculum vendor

Primary high school curriculum: Apex Learning (a major commercial digital curriculum provider)
CPA-original content: All Bible classes are CPA-developed in-house
Teaching model: Apex content + weekly one-on-one credentialed teacher meetings + Daily Discussion Forum + workshops + virtual events

Strategic implication — important. CPA’s AI strategy is partly downstream of what Apex Learning chooses to ship. Apex is itself moving on AI features (its parent Edmentum has been adding AI-powered tutoring and analytics to its products). CPA should:

Open a direct conversation with Apex about their AI roadmap as part of Phase 0. Understand what AI features Apex is shipping in 2026–27 and what the school’s options are for using, configuring, or opting out.
Treat Bible classes as the cleanest pilot territory for CPA-built AI integration, since the curriculum is fully internal — no vendor dependency. The W.I.S.E. Framework’s Worship and Image axes are most directly evaluable here.
Identify which Apex content blocks are best targets for layered CPA-specific AI tutoring vs. pure Apex use. Math is a strong candidate (well-studied tutoring research base) and likely an Apex-heavy course block.

Teaching model — distinctive features

These are real assets to leverage in the AI strategy:

Weekly one-on-one teacher meetings. This is the structural hook for the human-supervised AI tutoring model. The CMU-style hybrid AI tutoring research base maps directly onto a school that already has weekly 1:1 contact baked in.
Daily Discussion Forum. A structured space for daily devotions and student-to-student interaction. This is also a natural place to teach AI literacy in context — declared AI use, peer feedback on AI outputs, devotional engagement with AI-and-faith questions over time.
Pastoral teacher role (Mr. Clint Kyle). CPA already has a designated pastoral teacher who does explicit spiritual care of students. This role is the natural owner of the Worship and Steward axes of the AI policy in classroom practice.
Parent Ambassador Committee (PAC). Existing parent-engagement infrastructure. The AI rollout’s parent communication strategy should partner with PAC from Phase 0, not bypass it.
In-person graduation. A small but meaningful touchpoint — there is one annual moment when CPA families gather. The senior AI capstone project (in Phase 2) can be presented here, turning AI literacy into a shared community moment rather than an abstract curriculum line.

Leadership

Jared Beck — Director / Founder

Founded CPA in 2009. Lives in San Marcos, CA.
BA in Philosophy and Theology from Point Loma Nazarene University; MA in Education and Single Subject Teaching Credential (social science) from Azusa Pacific University; California Administrative Services Credential.
Board member of the American European Bethel Mission (a 120-year-old Jewish-Christian organization).
Personal interests: guitar/piano, surfing, hiking, Krav Maga, gardening (greenhouse, hundreds of plant varieties).

Implication for advisory style: Jared has a serious theological education (philosophy + theology + MEd) and is fluent in both academic and pastoral registers. The packet’s theological depth is appropriate for him; he is not a layman in this conversation.

Kimberly (Kim) Beck — School Advancement Strategist + Board Member

Joined staff April 2020. Board member since 2009.
BA English Literature, University of North Georgia. 16+ years prior paralegal experience in San Diego County.
Owns: school fundraising, communications, marketing/promotion, school community development with PAC and faculty.
Married Jared in 1998 (met on Molokai, Hawaii during missions). Two teenage children (a daughter “in Heaven” and a son “earth-side”). Homeschooling family for 9 years prior to launching CPA.

Implication for advisory style: Kim owns the constituencies most affected by AI rollout communications — parents, donors, students. She is the right person to shape and channel the parent-facing AI communication strategy. The packet’s concern about parent-trust dynamics (PDK/EdWeek’s 62%→49% drop) lands directly in her portfolio.

Other staff to know for AI strategy purposes

Nicole Paynter — Assistant Principal, mathematics-teaching background, joined 2019-20. The natural academic owner of a math AI-tutoring pilot.
Eleni Gillis — Admissions Director and K-5 Mentor, since 2013. The natural owner of how AI strategy gets communicated to prospective families and how it shapes K-5 mentorship.
Clint Kyle — Pastoral Teacher; 15 years pastoring experience (7 in South Africa); seminary training. Natural owner of the W.I.S.E. Worship axis in lived classroom practice; the right voice in faculty PD on theology of technology.
Laury White — Posts daily devotions in the Daily Discussion Forum; advisor for student leadership, yearbook, newsletter. The natural owner of student-formation-side AI literacy, including the daily devotional space.
Math teachers (Fankhauser, Russell, Witt, Paynter) — The pool from which the Phase 1 math AI tutoring pilot lead should be drawn. Russell already runs twice-weekly math workshops — an existing structure that AI tutoring can plug into.

What this changes in the recommendations

Phase 1 pilot subject confirmed: Math is the right Phase 1 pilot. Multiple credentialed math teachers, an existing math workshop structure (Russell), and an Assistant Principal with a math background give CPA the internal capacity to actually run the pilot well.
Bible classes are the right Phase 1 secondary pilot for CPA-built AI integration (since the curriculum is fully in-house and the W.I.S.E. axes apply most cleanly here). Mr. Kyle is the natural pastoral lead.
K-5 program is excluded from initial AI tutoring scope. AI literacy for K-5 happens through parent education and resources, not student-facing tools. That is consistent with the developmental research and matches CPA’s existing K-5 model.
Apex Learning relationship is a Phase 0 deliverable. Get clarity on Apex’s AI roadmap before locking the v1 policy. CPA’s policy needs to address what Apex ships even if CPA itself ships nothing yet.
The PAC and Daily Discussion Forum should both be early surfaces for AI rollout communication. Existing infrastructure; high trust; designed for exactly this kind of shared conversation.
The senior in-person graduation is a strategic moment for showcasing the senior AI capstone (Phase 2). Real community visibility for what CPA is building.

What this confirms in the strategic frame

CPA’s existing operating model (one-on-one credentialed teacher meetings, pastoral teacher role, daily devotions, Christian formation as the explicit center) is unusually well-fit to the hybrid human-supervised AI tutoring model the research base validates. CPA is not retrofitting an industrial classroom; it is layering AI onto an already-pastoral, already-relational, already-online structure.
The “we are an online Christian school with credentialed teachers and weekly 1:1s” pitch CPA already makes to families is the exact pedagogical pattern Brookings and CMU’s hybrid AI tutoring research validates as the design that produces gains. CPA does not need to change what it does. It needs to add a thoughtful AI layer to what it already does well.