Hillcrest Academy Ravens debut to public

KALONA - What was formerly known as Iowa Mennonite School will now be known as Hillcrest Academy. The school unveiled its new name and mascot, a raven, during an open house on Tuesday, July 30.

Dwight Gingerich, principal at Hillcrest Academy, said the reason for the rebranding was to attract more students and families to the school. Students are not required to be Mennonite to attend, but a common theme they have heard, he said, was that they felt they needed to because the name of the school implied it. About 60 percent of the school's students are Mennonite, Gingerich said.

'Really it's to open our doors to a larger community. We have a feeling the word Mennonite has been a barrier here (and) we want folks beyond the Mennonite church to know they're welcome here,” he said.

The school board then set forth on an 18-month journey that involved hiring an enrollment consultant and a marketing company to help them decide how to move forward. The decision was open to the community as well, as they were encouraged to submit ideas for the school name and mascot.

'It was a process that involved a lot of conversations, a lot of listening (and) surveys,” he said.

Jo Liechty, a school board member, said the process was long and difficult because of the school's history with the name Iowa Mennonite School, but was supportive of the new name and mascot and hopes it will bring in more families to the school.

'I hope that more people will think of coming to school here and find what the rest of us have seen, that it's a great place to go to school,” she said.

Esther Hughes, a sophomore at Hillcrest Academy, said she was excited for the name change and hoped it brought in more students. She said the school is a welcoming environment where she has met great friends and has had an opportunity to play a variety of sports and be involved in many activities.

Gingerich said Hillcrest was a name that came up most frequently in the surveys and it holds a lot of meaning at the school. According to a news release, Hillcrest Union was the name dedicated to the gym on campus in 1955.

'The name Hillcrest and the vision around this addition to our school embodies so much of who the school was, who they are, and who they want to be,” the release states.

Jeremy Ours, Director of Advancement at Hillcrest Academy, said the name is the perfect fit for the school's future. Ours said he spoke to several alumni who were excited and supportive of the name change, receiving many thumbs up as people filtered by.

Getting support from the community, he said, was incredibly important because without it, the school would not be where they are now.

'Our hope is that the community embraces this new identity and takes ownership and uses it as a foundation to different things that we hope to do moving forward that will allow us to grow our enrollment that will allow us to be a viable and relevant school in this community,” he said. 'Just as folks came together when they built Hillcrest Union in the ‘50s, no matter what sort of perspective they had, our hope is that all of our folks will come together to embrace this new identity and build on it to move us forward.”