CCLC gears up, cleans up for new year

Chuck Waters/Clarendon Citizen

The CCLC is getting ready for another year of teaching His word.

The Clarendon Christian Learning Center is a place for middle and high school students to learn about the Bible, life lessons and the life of Jesus.

The organization has grown since its inception in the late 1990s into the sturdy and promising program it is today.

In the late 90s, several parents of high school stu­dents began to meet every week.

They brainstormed about how good it would be if the children could learn about the Bible and its lessons dur­ing the school day while their minds were already set on learning.

The group planned, dis­cussed and prayed about this program for several years un­til they began in 1999.

They began with just a handful of students but had the full support from teach­ers and administration.

They have grown in the number of children they serve and want that to con­tinue well into the future.

 “By the time we began in 1999 with 30 high school students, every board mem­ber said ‘this is a great idea’; every administrator said ‘super. We’ve got to have this’,” said Director Kim DuRant. “In the following year, we expanded to junior high and we have just grown and grown, and we have served as many as upwards of 800 children.”

Being that no organized religious establishment is allowed on a school prop­erty, the CCLC now has a double-wide mobile home with multiple class rooms positioned right next door to the Manning High School campus separated by a tall fence.

Because of that, they are free to teach and do anything they see fit.

“The beauty of this build­ing is that we have two class rooms,” DuRant said. “Now, all the high school will be able to come in this, the ju­nior high will be able, too.”

There are three different locations for the program.

There is one building across the street from Man­ning Primary School which holds the offices for CCLC, the First Baptist Church al­lows two of their classrooms to be used and then the trailer is the final.

Throughout the program, they simply teach them the Bible and its messages.

Students learn the Old Testament in first semester and then the New Testament in the second semester.

“We teach them Bible,” DuRant said. “We usually start in Genesis and we go all the way through until time runs out. Usually, we try to go through the life of Jesus.”

DuRant said that the stu­dents enjoy walking off-cam­pus and the material is not the conventional curriculum they face in school everyday.

The children are still seated and learning, but it is something they are extreme­ly interested in and want to be there.

“It is a different lean­ing environment,” she said. “It’s non traditional. Every child would enjoy coming to CCLC. The only thing we want from the schools are the students.”