Bethel Christian School SWOT Analysis (Term Paper Sample)

Bethel Christian School SWOT Analysis Student’s Name Institutional Affiliation Table of Contents TOC \o "1-3" \h \z \u SWOT Analysis of Bethel Christian School PAGEREF _Toc404671825 \h 31.1Strengths of Bethel Christian School PAGEREF _Toc404671826 \h 31.2Weaknesses Bethel Christian school PAGEREF _Toc404671827 \h 51.3 Opportunities PAGEREF _Toc404671828 \h 71.4 Threats PAGEREF _Toc404671829 \h 8References PAGEREF _Toc404671830 \h 11 SWOT Analysis of Bethel Christian School The Bethel Christian School is a nonprofit organization also a member of the Association of Christian schools internationally. For the past years, its graduates have been able to attend various colleges and universities within Erie. The school is located on 1781 west 38th street in Erie, PA 16508. The school has the mission of assisting Christian guardians in fulfilling their duty for the training of their children through the provision of an education program that is holistically sound, Christ-honoring and optimum standards. The mission also provides the tools for the learners to excel in leadership and community-based service opportunities CITATION Gra13 \l 1033 (Budrys, 2013). To properly attain a better knowledge or understanding of Bethel Christian School, its environment, as well as its future action plan, it is prudent to analyze the organization through SWOT tool. SWOT analysis denotes a technique applied in evaluating an organization's external and internal environment to establish whether some factors are hindering or aiding the organization from attaining its main mandate. 1 Strengths of Bethel Christian School The nonprofit organization has the name-bearing "Bethel Christian School". The name attracts most parents with a religious background to bring their children to the school with the aim of achieving a biblically sound education. The school name implies that the organization seeks to produce learners who are able to recognize and put in practice the lordship of Christ in their life. Moreover, the name helps to pass a message that the learners get equipped to perform well in a society, not like any other citizen, but as individuals hailing from the Body of Christ.Bethel Christian School has a full-time teaching program with a strong bond. A high level of connection also exists between the teaching program and the learners. For instance, the teaching program incorporates full athletic programs such as volleyball and basketball. Once the learners have been taught, they are able to interact with the athletic program for their benefit of fitness.The school has also the strength of expertise in teaching modern students. Technological factors like the application of traditional tools for teaching may affect the school from adhering to its mission. This may include employment of older teaching staff with little knowledge of computers that form the basis of modern technology. The school has an advantage over this aspect through employment of qualified and certified Christian teachers. The organization adopts a comprehensiveness and facilitation modern technology impressing online education. This helps the learners to appreciate online E-learning and its importance towards achieving their goals CITATION Taf11 \l 1033 (Taft Group (Detroit, 2011). Political/governmental factors such as rules limiting the discipline of children are more likely to affect the moral values of the school. The school has Bethel church and parents as some of its stakeholders. This members have stipulated penalties corresponding to each misconduct committed by learners. The written penalties are made known to the learners during admission periods. This measures help to maintain the school on its mission course. The Erie government rejects the denial of education rights to its children unless in inevitable circumstances. This affects the school from exercising their disciplinary measures as the taken action may lie within the government jurisdiction as much as falling within the school boundary.Erie has a community that endorses arts and culture. The county of Erie is the home of many professional performing arts. It has also museums like the Erie Art museum and playhouses like The Erie play house. Buildings like Bicentennial Tower all tend to explain the social culture which express art and cultural acting. This knowledge has been widely utilized by the Erie stockholders to incorporate an academic program which as much as teaching Christ-honoring education, gives learners a chance to exploit their talent in acting. Bethel Christ School has different enhancement courses such as music and art that are Christian based. The learners are presented with disciplinary socially accepted acting culture that enables them continue pursuing acting after joining colleges and various universities. Based on December 2012, the rate of unemployment within Erie was 9% as compared to Pennsylvania and the US which recorded 8.4 and 9.5 unemployment rates respectively. The figures indicate the economic state of the country as most population do not have sufficient cash to take their children in modern schools. This affects the strength of the school with regard to school fees. The school offers education at subsidized rates something of which some parents are not willing to pay for due to the expensiveness and bad economic stability. 2 Weaknesses Bethel Christian school The school being a nonprofit organization implies that it relies on school fees and donations from well-wishers to run its services. Moreover third party payers such as insurance companies fund nonprofit organizations within Erie County. From the fact that user fees and donations income happen to be reported together on a common line of the form that is Form 990, it becomes inevitable to separate the amount from each source. Due to the growing number of nonprofit educational organizations within Erie, the school suffers underfunding and at times lacks financial support from educational scholarship. As per the year 2013, 13,814,843 dollars were donated to 38 educational nonprofits in the Erie area. This figure may be insufficient for an organization with modern programs and goals to achieve. For instance, Bethel Christian School houses Microsoft office and computers for E-learning both which require more costs to maintain in comparison to the funding it gets from third-party payers. Cultural and ethnic diversity is among factors thriving as the school weakness. A number of schools exist within Erie with diversified mode of culture. Traditional parents consider education as the primary reason of taking their kids to school and more often refrain their children from engaging in non-educational activities like music and cultural acting. Further, the Erie county religion is diversified implying that those guardians not affiliated to Christian based learning organizations are less likely to allow their children learn in this institutions. The overall result is a school with declining enrollment housing most of the clients with holistic background.In the mid-1980s, the school witnessed declining enrollment though at some point booming student admissions was observed. Up to date, patterns associated with uneven growth are observed which makes learning problematic. Future plans to open up new classes are underway in order to address the occurrence of the problem in the future CITATION Tim11 \l 1033 (Adsit, 2011).The population of Erie is served by the Erie Times- News which is the only newspaper within the city. The paper is transported by one of the teachers or a worker affiliated with the Bethel Christian School in order to be read later by both the learners and the teachers. The newspaper is written in English and uses advanced vocabularies prevailing within the Erie society. Young students who may not have achieved a developed reading style loss the advantage. Moreover, from the fact that the city has to publish all the information on just a single newspaper, information that the school perceives important may be left out. This presents Bethel as an organization with insufficient source of external information to its juvenile learners. The Erie public schools take a large number of students than their private counterparts. The public schools enroll approximately 13,000 learners in both primary and secondary grades. The region has 23 public schools ranging from elementary to charter schools. The area has over 40 private schools and academies. The number continues to grow as the government untightens its rules concerning to school start-up and learning. This is a government measure to ensure more learners access education. The government strategy affects the Bethel school as it has no control over external factors and has to compete for the children within a large scale of competitive educational organizations offering similar services. 1.3 Opportunities Bethel Christian School provides an opportunity of continuous academic learning. The learning provides knowledge that enriches the learners intellectually. The learning process is facilitated by the availability of an up to date library system that enables the learners to get easy and quick access to the learning materials.The institution provides opportunities through the application of information communication and technology (ICT) to reach out people across all nations in the world. ICT is also applied in e-learning for instance the use of projectors in classes. Use of internet-based learning among other forms of learning. Bethel Christian School has made available easy access to classes and has also ensured that there is a residential place for it has the immediate workforce. This strategy has made the school able to operate in line with its objectives because the school staff are able to report to their duties in time thus ensuring high output in the learners who tend to have more tim...