Testimony of a 13 year old
Ever since I have gone to Kimber Academy I feel so spiritual. I love learning more about the gospel and all the stories & it is helping me grow my testimony it’s so amazing, I can’t explain it.
Dr. Kimber is so sweet and everyone there is so nice they are all like family and they don’t care what you look like or anything. They have good positive attitudes and good posture. I have learned so much that I didn’t know and I know it will help me throughout my life.
I love the school like, it’s my home. Everyone has a good attitude about themselves we learn there how to use the spirit & I love that no one swears (like public schools do) and they all dress modest! It’s just the best school I have ever gone to. I keep growing and becoming closer to heavenly father!! it has made me want to learn and helps me want to do all things through heavenly father! I love Kimber!! 2012
Testimony of a 10 yr old 2012
“I know it might seem weird to pray and sing hymns and read scriptures at school, but it’s not. This is how education was designed to be. The founding fathers thought so. In our public schools, we are shutting out Christ. Teachers are not allowed to read scriptures or anything that talks about Christ to us. We are not allowed to speak about Christ. Religion is a subject that we should study every day. We should have our personal scripture study, but it is important at school to study religion and the book of Mormon, too. The spirit told me this school was right.
A message from a former Graduate of Kimber Academy
I want to begin by talking about Graduation.
I graduated in 2005 when I was 16 years old. To be honest, it was hard for me to graduate. I have always had a different learning style. I am a very hands-on person.
When I first started Kimber Academy I had a hard time sitting in class for 4 hours straight. As some people may recall, I wasn’t known for being shy, quiet or polite all the time. If the limbs of my body were holding still, my mouth sure wasn’t. Thankfully over the years I was able to gain control over that….for the most part. And if an adult wasn’t in the room, why on earth would you actually sit and do your school work?
Thankfully, this behavior changed over the years.
So back to graduation. I prepared myself for this by studying each hook date, then recalling EVERYTHING I could on each one. Then I would read through and see which ones I was lacking in and go back and read those over.
When I first started at Kimber Academy I couldn’t remember the stories for the life of me, but after I got the hook dates down, and really engaged myself and followed the steps that Dr. Kimber teaches of saying a prayer and asking for the spirit to help, recalling what I learned truly became easier.
For me the story form of recalling facts was a lot easier than just recalling random facts on each hook date. I remember being in class when Dr. Kimber would start the daily recall by timing us to see how many facts we would get. I could hardly remember a thing, but once I was asked to recall the STORY I could give 100 facts in a heartbeat, just by telling the story. So for me I didn’t recall facts, but I would write the story down.
My thesis was the easy part of graduation for me. I struggled with the testing. I hadn’t prepared myself properly for that part. I tried and failed, and thankfully we had a great classroom aid that invested a lot of her energy and faith in me. She worked with me many hours to help me with math, and it paid off.
Kimber Academy was a great school for me because it allowed me to learn in the style needed for me.
Now I would like to give a little background about me.
I started attending Kimber Academy in 2001. I had just turned 13 yrs old. I wasn’t too excited. My mom pulled me and my little sister out of public school at the beginning of my 7th grade year. She tried to homeschool us. Tried being the key word. Not to discredit her attempt, I however did not co-operate. It ended up being me doing chores, because I would choose not to listen to her. Then I had to do school with my Dad when he got home from work in the evenings.
My mom had a strong impression to pull me out of public school. She had a dream that I was skipping classes and making out with 9th graders in the hall. She didn’t tell me, until years later, that bringing us home was all based on her dream and the impressions she got. I laughed at it for a while thinking “I guess she didn’t trust me, but what teenager doesn’t kiss a boy.”
There were 2 girls at my church that I was best friends with since we were 8. We did everything together up to the point when my Mom pulled me out of public school. At first we tried to hang out as much as we could, but as time went on we drifted apart. That year my mom was introduced to Dr. Kimber by some friends in our neighborhood who homeschooled. That is when my mom and dad decided to pull my brother just older than me out of public school too, and send myself and 2 other siblings to Kimber Academy.
Over time my friends from church had distanced themselves, and they would tell me I had changed. They could never tell me how or what I was doing differently but clearly they didn’t want to be around me anymore. I didn’t really care because I had made so many new friends at Kimber Academy, and we all seemed to naturally gel together. We all were friends instantly.
As I said before, I graduated in 2005 and I continued to attend classes through the following year to participate in student officer duties and participate with the Classes that were filmed for the homeschooling program. In June 2006 my peers at public school were graduating. At the time of their graduation I was in Israel with Dr. Kimber. I got an email while there, that one of my “best friends” from my church was pregnant and would be getting married the week before I got home from the 3 week trip in Israel. But to add to it, my other “best friend” had already gotten pregnant her Junior year. As the years unfolded, I was really thankful for my parents following the spirit and sending us to Kimber Academy.
I learned that I had not changed, Rather I was taught to stay true to myself and my values. I was able learn the things that were going to help prepare me for my role in the world — how to follow to spirit and know how to go to the Lord in times of trials, and at those times when I needed strength.
At the beginning of my experience at Kimber Academy I thought Dr. Kimber was a little extreme in the way that he taught us about being ladies and gentlemen. The guys were always holding the doors for us girls, among other things. When we were traveling with Dr. Kimber people who would meet us were really taken back by the respect we showed each other. The guys would jump out of the vehicle to hold the doors for us girls. To us it had become a way of life and it attracted many who would want to be around us because of that respect we had for one another.
When I would go to public school sponsored activities and even church dances, it was easy to see that this respect was not taught to many. Being taught in an atmosphere that allowed me to be who Heavenly Father wants me to be without the outside world trying to knock me down was exactly what I needed.
I am thankful for the lessons I learned from Dr. Kimber to honor the guys, and to be someone who would allow them to honor their values as well. This was a big factor in choosing who I married. I dated a lot, and a lot of different types of boys. But I always knew that I wanted to marry a man who honored his manhood and honored me and treated me with the same respect.
Kimber Academy helped reassure me that I can be a mother in this world and still raise righteous children. It taught me that my husband and myself are responsible to the Lord for what we teach our children by the things we allow in our home, as well as the things we participate in ourselves.
I recall many lectures from Dr. Kimber about being parents and our roles in our children’s lives. A phrase that I always think of is “Children look to mothers for guidance and to fathers for acceptance.” He can tell you the source on that. I know my role as a mother is divine and requires faith and trust in Heavenly Father. It’s true, you do learn of these things at church, but for me I enjoyed being able to learn about these topics in more depth and have the opportunity to hear about these topics at school — from Dr. Kimber as well as from church leaders and other guest speakers.
Most people never learn about these topics in depth until they are adults. I feel it helped strengthen me and gave me a stronger foundation to start my family with, than I otherwise would have. Most young mothers I know are terrified at the responsibility of raising their children in this world. I’m thankful for the foundation that Kimber Academy gave me. It helped me strengthen and build upon that foundation to give me that confidence as a mother.
Being able to go to school in an environment where I was able to feel the spirit, and how to learn from the spirit prepared me for some of the greatest trials in my life and some of the most dear to my heart experiences.
One of them happened in 2007 when my family lost our father to Kidney Cancer. It was the hardest trial I’ve had to endure, yet the most rewarding. I am the 8th of 9 kids in my family, and as the months went on after my Dad’s passing, it became very clear between us kids who had stayed close to the church and God over time, and who hadn’t.
Thankfully I had a foundation that I was able to rely on. It wasn’t easy losing my Dad at such a young age, but I was able to turn to the Lord and ask to understand his Will. A few of my siblings questioned the Lord’s will and were very angry as to why it had to happen to our family. Through the trial of my Dad battling cancer for 9 months and after his passing, I relied on my studies of the scriptures and the holy spirit to help me learn and understand what the Lord had planned.
It gives me great comfort to know my Dad lives on and has a greater calling on the other side that couldn’t be done in this earthly state. I owe part of my strength to the opportunities I had to learn first hand from Hartman Rector and Dr. Kimber and others in my life who taught to me to turn to the Lord when I had questions or concerns.
Being a part of Kimber Academy has enriched my life. I made friendships that will last a life time, that are unique from most — not only with peers my age but with adults too. The teachings at Kimber Academy gave me the strength I needed to rise above the world and be who the Lord wants me to be.