NorthStar Through the Ages — NorthStar Navigator

By The Navigator Staff

From using dial-up internet to having a meeting with teachers across the world in an instant, NSA’s rich past is worth a review. The history of submitting school work and talking to fellow students at NorthStar is quite extensive and something many people are unfamiliar with. How did NSA begin as a school? What was the FirstClass system? Where will we be in the near future? A look back at the ancient memoirs of students and teachers answers these questions. The Navigator staff invites you on a journey through time the ages showcasing NorthStar’s spectacular history.

The Foundational Age: The Vision of NorthStar

NSA was founded around 1998 by Brett Bowers in Sherwood Park, Alberta, Canada. However, it has moved many times since then. Mr. Ronald Bellamy says that from its original home in Sherwood Park, it’s moved to Montana, then again to Colorado, and lastly, to its current home in Southaven, Mississippi, for the 2008-2009 school year.

Originally, NSA was one school, and later, it was split up into two sections: Northstar US and Northstar Canada.

Northstar’s origin in Canada has a very interesting story. Mr. Neal Peterson says, “Brett had first contacted me in the fall of 95, I believe, asking if Wycliffe [a missionary organization Neal was in] might be interested in online schooling. I think he was finishing or had just finished a degree from Texas A&M in distance learning.”

From surveys he had given parents, Mr. Peterson was positive that online schooling would be a hit! He talked with Brett Bower and asked him to speak to Wycliffe about his ideas.

“Brett was able to recruit several Wycliffe students willing to enroll in the Cyberhigh online school out of Canada. It didn’t work so well as Cyberhigh’s focus was more on a Canadian curriculum since their provincial government was financing the education of these students. Brett was getting more and more frustrated as well, since his recruiting efforts of American students weren't really appreciated, and he eventually resigned from Cyberhigh with the hope of starting an online school for anyone, but especially designed for families in ministry.”

Well, the first step to starting a school is getting the school’s name! Different names floated around, such as “Saber Academy” or “Crusaders Academy.”

“Jane and I felt that [name] probably wouldn't fly in missions given the global political realities in the world! Then Jane suggested NorthStar Academy. Brett took that name and ran with it.”

But, like with anything, difficulties and problems were determined to pop up everywhere!

“There were discouraging times. Many thought it wouldn’t work, that either the technology or quality would result in substandard education. Getting accreditation was nearly impossible, funding was very tight. But God had other plans and NSA survived and eventually prospered!”

Ultimately, NSA is an amazing reminder that God’s plan is bigger than anyone can ever imagine! Mr. Peterson says, “One missionary mom started crying when I asked her what she would have done if NSA hadn’t been available.” She didn’t want to miss her kids’ high school lives while she was working in Nepal. If NSA hadn’t existed, she might have.

The Early Age: Academic History

Before the fancy days of Buzz and Microsoft Teams, NorthStar, like every online school, went through a rather medieval era. NorthStar was actually the very first online Christian school to be accredited, and it started out tiny, only consisting of FirstClass and Skype. Back then, NSA followed a traditional school year schedule with a dedicated summer break instead of the flexible 6-month semester allotments like we do now.

One of NorthStar’s teachers, Mrs. Cox, said that one thing that was a big issue was the file sizes. She said that many “students had limited internet and therefore needed to download lessons in order to work offline. We compiled a Resource CD which contained copies of larger files that were needed for classes. This was sent to the students with whatever books/resources they ordered”…like I said, it was medieval. On FirstClass, teachers and faculty experimented with due dates and late penalties but found it was rather complicated and many of the students required more of the flexibility that came without those things. But as far as academics go, FirstClass served its purpose well. Mrs. Cox said, “We used FirstClass for a long time and it was all-inclusive.”

In 2011, NSA made the switch from FirstClass to a program called BrainHoney. Riley, an NSA alumni said, “Imagine Brainhoney as an old version of Buzz. Submitting assignments worked like Buzz, but there was no autosave. Tests were like Buzz too, but again there was no auto save.” He also said that a “major difference is the interface where you would see weekly assignments. They looked like folders on a computer.” There were even discussion boards like Buzz has, just formatted differently.

The Hidden Age: Social Lore

FirstClass was used from the very beginning of NSA’s history, when it was founded in 1998. However, that part of NSA’s history remains largely a mystery, since there are no records from that time. According to Mr. Horneck, NSA’s former data analyst, current records on student numbers and interaction don’t begin until 2010, when NorthStar had six-hundred and seventy-five students.

The year 2010 is actually known as the beginning of the “Golden Age,” generally accepted to be the most fruitful and organized period of student interaction and government in FirstClass. This is when most of the ancient NSA lore was rolled out, as well as being the most prosperous time of the Noble and Ancient Thread (NaAT), the Mages Guild, and other organizations. The NaAT (Noble and Ancient Thread) and Mages Guild were two very important role-playing threads in FirstClass. I don’t really know how the NaAT got started, I wasn’t around back then. By the time I got there, it was a fully established system of knights. Most of the knights were juniors or seniors, and they had squires. The bottom of the barrel were the Pages, and you became a Page the moment you joined the thread. The NaAT was called that because it was a very huge thread back in the day, I think it got about eighty-something-thousand messages, which is legendary by FirstClass standards. The NaAT, having defeated Zer0, the arch-enemy of NSA and very powerful cybervillain, mainly just went around questing and looking for the famed NSA Diamonds. The Mages Guild was very closely affiliated with the NaAT. It is what it sounds like, a guild for those with magical powers. First, you were tested to see what you had an affinity for (aquamancy, pyromancy, creation magic, life, null, etc) and then you were mentored by another mage with the same affinity. It’s a lot more complex than that, but it would take me far too long to explain everything. The Mages and Knights of the two threads (more often than not, they were mages and knights) would sometimes create portals and work together on their threads. However, they worked alone often enough to be separate organizations. There are a few things about the NaAT I never really understood or discovered because we switched from FirstClass to soon, but here are some things I sort of vaguely saw: knights had dragons, people could switch their role in the roleplay from knight to villain if they wanted, sometimes knights would die and then come back to life or get kidnapped if they had to leave in real life, and of course, the ever-tantalizing NSA Diamonds. These and many more secrets are locked in the minds of the people who worked and lived in the threads - we can discover some things in the Wiki, but without talking to an actual knight, we can’t know for sure.

Since the students were so quickly prosperous, according to the records, it is reasonably safe to assume that the groundwork for this Golden Age was laid before 2010, indicating that student interaction probably began before that. This reveals to us the possibility of a “hidden age” of FirstClass, a time when no records were kept and no student interaction was documented in the form of thread, Google Docs, or Microsoft Word. The only record is in the memory of the students who were there at the time - most likely, we will never know.

The Alteration Age: Modifying and Adapting

FirstClass (FC) was deeply integrated into NSA’s culture and communication. FirstClass was a messaging system that was helpful for many students but also was a burden to many others. Some people enjoyed the emails and group messaging, but others prefer the Teams format that we have now.

Tirzah, a current student at NSA, said that FC wasn't very similar to Teams because the way of sending messages was very different and not as easy. With Teams, it's pretty easy for a popular post to get over 1,000 messages. On FirstClass, this was a very phenomenal achievement and only happened a few times. The replies were also different. You had to reply to the thread as a group - it was kind of like editing a doc with other people. Everyone had their personal font and/or color so that people could know who was who. This made it easier to conduct quests because you could look at the entire thread like it was a story instead of having to sift through individual messages like in Teams. It was also easier to keep things on track that way.

I would agree with her that Teams has a much more fluid posting system and is easier to work with. Similarly, FC had many ways to reach Mega Groups. Teams is much more divided and separated. FC had emails and MegaChats that could reach multiple people at the same time. Teams still have the same thing with their multiple group chats.

The Modern Age: Where We Are Now, BrainHoney to Buzz, Settling Down

The past few years have brought many changes to the learning system that we use at NSA. Just five or six years ago, students used a different system, called BrainHoney. While it was essentially the same as Buzz, there were some differences. Both systems are provided by Agilix. “We have always been with the same company,” says Mrs. Pam Horneck, NSA’s Education Director, “but when they made big changes, they changed the name from BrainHoney to Buzz.”

Some of the bigger changes include a more modern look, more capabilities for course building for teachers, and the ability for students to use it on a variety of devices. Overall, Buzz is a much more user-friendly platform for everyone involved. Buzz is continuing to update, although most are not seen by students. NSA is not planning on any major changes for Buzz. “We don’t have any intentions of leaving them,” says Mrs. Horneck. “Buzz is the learning management system that works best with all the things we do at NorthStar.”

Agilix and Buzz allow for rolling enrollment, start dates every week, and help the teachers grade all of their students’ work. “Agilix likes to remain cutting-edge and make changes, so we will stay with them and grow with them,” says Mrs. Horneck. Having Buzz as a Learning Management System is part of what makes NSA such a great school for teachers, parents, and students all over the world.

The Future Age: Where We Will Be

Student and faculty communication remains an important factor for NSA. FirstClass continued to be NorthStar’s main social platform until mid-2019. Around the summer months, the administration began what was known as “the Switch.” According to NSA’s Support team, the main reason that NorthStar began looking for a new communication system was that “FirstClass would no longer be offered through our [previous] host.”

A new school year and social platform brought about the end of secret folders and instant messaging. Instead, channels and more permanent private messages became the next big student social platform.

When it was first announced NorthStar would be switching to Microsoft Teams, there were some mixed opinions. Many students were excited about the change and what new adventures it would bring. Others were more hesitant to say goodbye to the place of deep seated tradition they had come to appreciate.

Alexis, a current NorthStar sophomore, explained how her unique FirstClass experience made her excited for the change. “As I had a chromebook, it was very messy and frustrating to work around [with FirstClass],” she said. “It was hard to have a personal chat with someone and the emails were a pain to send. It was hard to actually interact with anyone there, and due to that, I switched to Skype. FC [for me] was only used for emails to teachers, where Teams can be anything you want! It can be a place to call your teachers or interact with friends. You can go to live sessions and call each other, something FC did not offer. Overall, I prefer Microsoft Teams and Outlook to FirstClass.”

Looking toward the next school year and beyond, members of the Navigator staff shared their hopes for what Teams will become in the future. “I kind of like to think of teams as the hallways of our virtual school,” says Karis. “I think it would be cool if it continues to be a place where students can connect and form close friendships with other students.”

When asked her opinion, Tirzah agreed, saying, “I think a place for students to interact is what I hope Teams both is and always will be.”

The Navigator staff hopes that this article will serve as a record and inspiration for the next generation of students at NSA. Throughout the ages, NorthStar will continue to be a light to people all over the world as its founders intended.

“May NSA continue to come alongside families and provide that educational community of learners and educators to meet the needs of families in ministry around the world.”

-Mr. Peterson (an NSA founder)

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