Rehoboth School bidding Polinders goodbye
Outgoing Rehoboth Christian School executive director Ron Polinder and his wife, Colleen, pose together in the school's administrative complex Wednesday. — © 2009 Gallup Independent / Cable Hoover

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Staff writer

REHOBOTH — With the close of this school year, Rehoboth Christian School will be closing another chapter in its own century-old history.

Executive Director Ron Polinder and his wife, Colleen, an administrative assistant at the school, will be leaving after nine years. The couple first worked at Rehoboth from 1972 to 1982, starting out as dorm parents in the very same building where they now have offices. They returned in 2000 to serve in their present positions. The couple will be moving back to their hometown of Lynden, Wash., where they grew up as childhood sweethearts.

Ron Polinder will be replaced by Dr. Sidney DeWaal, a native of the Netherlands who has lived and worked in the United States for years. An educator with several graduate degrees, DeWaal has extensive experience in higher education, counseling, and theology. He will be joined by his wife, Janet, also an educator and counselor.

Compelling community

According to the couple, they revisited the school in the summer of 1999 while Rehoboth was undergoing a transition in its administration. They were asked to come back, they said, and they agreed to return for one school year. That one year ended up stretching into nine.

“There was something very compelling about this school, this setting, and this community,” Ron Polinder recalled of their decision to stay.

Since that time, the school has seen enrollment grow, and school officials have embarked on an ambitious plan of upgrading an aging campus and constructing a number of new facilities like the expanded high school science lab, a new middle school, the Navajo Code Talkers Communications Center, a soccer field and track, and a sports and fitness center. They’ve also upgraded Rehoboth’s infrastructure with new electric, gas, sewer, and waterlines.

But for Polinder, a sports enthusiast, the construction of the sports center with its gleaming basketball courts was a highlight for many fellow Rehoboth fans. “The joy of that new building,” he said. “There’s been a lot of sheer delight in all of that.”

Along with all that construction has been the constant struggle to keep the school financially stable and affordable.

“We live on the edge. That weighs on you,” said Polinder, who added it’s the same struggle that all private schools face.

The school has operated only one year in the red, the couple said, which Colleen Polinder gives divine credit. “God has been faithful,” she said.

According to Ron Polinder, the school currently has an annual budget of $4 million. Tuition brings in $1.4 million each year, he explained, which doesn’t cover even one-half of the real tuition costs. Interested donors across the country help by making financial contributions.

Place and purpose

The couple agreed their most difficult times have centered on the human losses the school community has suffered, from the deaths of students because of tragic accidents and diseases to the deaths of a number of individuals with close ties to Rehoboth families.

Compared to their rather tranquil hometown in Washington state, Ron Polinder said many local families experience higher levels of trauma and violence that are often mirrored in the headlines of the Independent and are sometimes mirrored in the lives of Rehoboth students and their families.

As a result, Rehoboth’s role as a Christian school is something he is very passionate about.

“Education without God is incomplete,” he said, explaining the school tries to help students see they are not alone in the world and they have a place and a purpose. “It’s not just about buildings and budgets,” he said of the school’s mission. “Fundamentally, it’s about kids, and families, and values, and world views.”

As part of the school’s own evolving world view, Polinder and other Rehoboth officials issued “A Message of Confession and Reconciliation” in December 2003 as part of the school’s centennial celebration. In the message, which is still posted on the school’s Web site, officials apologized for incidents of racism and cultural insensitivity that had been part of the school’s 100 year history.

“I’m glad we did it. I still agree with it,” Polinder said. “We have to be open to some critique from future generations for our blindness, shortsightedness,” he added.

Since they first arrived at Rehoboth in 1972, the Polinders said they have been pleased to see the school community become more multi-cultural, with friendships established across cultural lines. “I think we have intentionally tried to live up to our motto of being beautifully diverse,” Ron Polinder said.

In addition to seeing those friendships develop among students, Colleen Polinder said she has experienced similar friendships in her own experience at Rehoboth. “It’s going to be very, very difficult to leave here,” she said of those personal ties. “The blessing is the relationships and the new friends we’ve made.”