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Community at BFA

A working, caring community of learners, made up of teachers and students, constitutes the heart of Ben Franklin Academy's approach to learning. Each member of our BFA community wants to be here, and each is obligated to follow the same four rules. For us, work, acceptance and caring are the hallmarks of our community.

BFA students and teachers are deeply concerned with mastery of materials and concepts – our high school credits are based on students actually knowing their subjects. Our extraordinary teachers work actively to help students learn. They function as helpers in the learning process by showing students how to learn and demonstrate their knowledge.

Our sense of community is critical to our effectiveness as a school. We deliberately create, encourage and nourish the values of helpfulness and care of each other, our environment, our gardens and our animals. We want our students to feel our respect for them and to respect each other and their teachers as outlined in our Four Rules:

1. Do your own work and avoid interfering with the work of others. Be gentle with the equipment, furnishings, and animals. Be sensitive to the needs, concerns, property and feelings of the rest of us.
2. Do what teachers and staff members tell you.
3. No fighting or hate speech.* No weapons, tobacco or tobacco-related products, illegal drugs or alcohol on school property.
4. Don't let the cats out.

* Any fight with any BFA student, anywhere.

We encourage a strong student-advisor relationship. Every student has three advisors who are faculty members – their primary academic advisor, their work-study advisor, and their co-advisor in case one of the other advisors is absent.

Community Contract

We are a committed learning community that gives each student the opportunity and encouragement to develop the knowledge, as well as the analytical and self-management skills for excellence in college work.

As a consequence, the Faculty and Trustees of BFA have determined that BFA will be a drug-free environment. We do not admit students from drug rehabilitation facilities or wilderness programs, who have a history of difficulties with substance abuse.

In order to become a member of the BFA community, and to ensure that BFA remains a productive, drug-free learning environment for all of its members, students must agree to abstain from the illegal use of drugs while they are members of the BFA community, and to submit to random drug testing.

Our Neighboring  Communities

BFA also plays an active part in other communities - Emory University and the Clifton Corridor Traffic Management Association, the Clifton Corridor Transportation Management Association, the Georgia Online Database Consortium, the City Schools of Decatur, the Coalition of Essential Schools, the Druid Hills Civic Association, the Southern Association of Independent Schools, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, the Georgia Independent Schools Association and the Atlanta Area Association of Independent Schools, among others.