Hillcrest Lutheran Academy is a private

Christian Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...

school A school is an educational institution designed to provide learning spaces and learning environments for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is sometimes compuls ...

Fergus Falls Fergus Falls is a city in and the county seat of Otter Tail County, Minnesota, Otter Tail County, Minnesota, United States. The population was 14,119 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. History The falls from which the city gets par ...

Minnesota Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over to ...

. Established in 1916, Hillcrest is affiliated with the

Church of the Lutheran Brethren of America The Church of the Lutheran Brethren of America (CLBA) is a Lutheran denomination of Christians rooted in a Pietist Lutheran spiritual awakening at the turn of the 20th century. History Origins Following the occurrence of a Pietist spiritual ...

. Hillcrest's mission is "to equip students in a Christ-centered Bible-based environment for a life of eternal significance." Hillcrest holds

accreditation Accreditation is the independent, third-party evaluation of a conformity assessment body (such as certification body, inspection body or laboratory) against recognised standards, conveying formal demonstration of its impartiality and competence to ...

as a non-public high school through Cognia (formerly AdvancED) and the Minnesota Nonpublic School Accrediting Association (MNSAA).

Campus

Hillcrest occupies an historic building constructed in 1901 by the Norwegian Lutheran Synod to house the Park Region Luther College. The four-story red

brick A brick is a type of block used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term ''brick'' denotes a block composed of dried clay, but is now also used informally to denote other chemically cured cons ...

and

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

building, located on a hilltop overlooking the city, is in the

Romanesque Revival Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

style and was designed by Twin Cities

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

s Omeyer and Thori, who also designed educational buildings at St. Olaf College,

courthouse A courthouse or court house is a building that is home to a local court of law and often the regional county government as well, although this is not the case in some larger cities. The term is common in North America. In most other English-spe ...

s in Windom and

Ada Ada may refer to: Places Africa * Ada Foah, a town in Ghana * Ada (Ghana parliament constituency) * Ada, Osun, a town in Nigeria Asia * Ada, Urmia, a village in West Azerbaijan Province, Iran * Ada, Karaman, a village in Karaman Province, ...

, and the E.J. Webber house and Ole Hagen's Autograph Block in Fergus Falls. Its construction, supervised by contractor John Lauritzen, required all of the

brick mason A bricklayer, which is related to but different from a mason, is a craftsman and tradesman who lays bricks to construct brickwork. The terms also refer to personnel who use blocks to construct blockwork walls and other forms of masonry. ...

s available in the area. The building is listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

.Park Region Luther College - 715 W. Vernon Ave.
City of Fergus Falls website Park Region Luther College operated on the site until 1932, when the synod decided to concentrate its academic efforts on Concordia College in Moorhead. Three years later, the campus was sold to the Church of the Lutheran Brethren, which operates Hillcrest Academy. Hillcrest served as the high school department of Lutheran Brethren Schools from its founding until 2003, when it was incorporated as a separate school directly under the Church of the Lutheran Brethren, with its own president and school board. HLA continued to share the campus with Lutheran Brethren Seminary, the theological training institute of the Church of the Lutheran Brethren. That was until in 2015, the seminary building was given to Hillcrest, which was renovated to the new Student Union, and the seminary moved across the street to a new addition attached to The Church of the Lutheran Brethren synod offices. In 2020 Hillcrest Lutheran Academy merged with Morning Son Christian School to become one school: Hillcrest Lutheran Academy with a Classical Christian education for students in preschool through 12th grade

Athletics

Hillcrest won the Minnesota 9-Man State Football Title in 2001 under Head Coach Richard Risbrudt and participating at the state level in basketball and soccer as well. Coach Risbrudt is also enshrined in the Minnesota High School Football Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Hillcrest's mascot is Winkey the Comet and the school colors are red and white.

International partnerships

For the last three decades, Hillcrest has had a partnership with the

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

high school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

Danielsen Videregående Skole (Danielsen High School) in

Bergen Bergen (), historically Bjørgvin, is a city and municipality in Vestland county on the west coast of Norway. , its population is roughly 285,900. Bergen is the second-largest city in Norway. The municipality covers and is on the peninsula of ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

. Each year, 25 to 30 Norwegian students attend Hillcrest as juniors. In recent years, many international students have attended HLA as well.

Notable alumni

Hillcrest has had some notable alumni including former

Chief of Chaplains of the United States Army The Chief of Chaplains of the United States Army (CCH) is the chief supervising officer of the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps. (Chaplains do not hold commanding authority). From 1775 to 1920, chaplains were attached to separate units. The Office of th ...

, General Gaylord T. Gunhus and aviation and construction pioneer Elling Halvorson who constructed a 13.5 mile water pipeline through the Grand Canyon in the 1960's and founder of Papillion Airways.

References

External links

Official Website
{{authority control Private high schools in Minnesota Lutheran schools in Minnesota Boarding schools in Minnesota Educational institutions established in 1916 Schools in Otter Tail County, Minnesota Private middle schools in Minnesota Fergus Falls, Minnesota 1916 establishments in Minnesota Church of the Lutheran Brethren of America