PHILANTROPHY
In the fall of 2011, The Nicholas Sparks Foundation was founded to support the causes and charities that are personally important to the author. While Nicholas and his wife have donated nearly $10,000,000 to local, regional and national causes - including education, veteran support, Alzheimer’s care and research, childhood disease research and care, and animal rescue organizations - education remains a top priority.
The Foundation is committed to inspiring and transforming students' lives through education, curriculum development, and life changing international experiences, so they are prepared to embrace a life of being active learners and engaged global citizens. Its goals for our future leaders include instilling confidence, introducing foreign languages, and exploring cultural versatility, while offering a global perspective to help them prepare for the 21st century.
For more information about the Nicholas Sparks Foundation, visit NSparksFoundation.org.
As their kids all came to be elementary school-aged, Nicholas and his wife began thinking more about the local school options for their kids in New Bern, NC. As New Bern is a small town with limited school options, they decided to build a school for the community themselves. In 2005, they joined with Thomas McLaughlin to facilitate community meetings with town residents about everything they could possibly want for their kids. The consensus was to create a place where students of all different faith backgrounds could learn in a traditional Judeo-Christian environment that would also foster a completely global education. Quickly, a vision began to take shape, and on August 28, 2006, The Epiphany School for Global Studies opened for its first school year.
The Epiphany School for Global Studies is an independent, coeducational, college preparatory school that is rooted in the Christian faith. Founded in 2005, it opened its doors in August 2006 to 95 pioneering students in grades 6-10. Currently, the student body is comprised of motivated students from over ten municipalities in coastal North Carolina. Though our school families have diverse backgrounds and experiences, from physicians, to farmers, to Marines, all are united in sustaining a rigorous learning environment that develops the mind, body and spirit of our students. Epiphany School is a community of faith and scholarship that challenges students to uncover and expand their unique God-given gifts. It sends forth men and women who will wisely devote themselves to lifelong learning, faithful discipleship, courageous leadership and compassionate service throughout their life journeys.
Epiphany is home to a first-rate faculty of passionate scholars who inspire students with teachings from an academic curriculum that many universities consider the finest in the world. Like all schools, Epiphany embraces its responsibility to impart the knowledge and skills that are essential for living. It is a school distinguished by a rigorous and nurturing environment in which students evolve into the best versions of themselves. Epiphany provides a vast array of educational opportunities that challenge young people to embrace their gifts and share them confidently with others, and where students can participate in a full range of co-curricular activities including athletics, music, theater and art. Travel as education is an essential part of the school’s curriculum. By the time every student has graduated, he or she will have visited 26 countries on six continents to study everything in context from history of the Americas amidst Mayan ruins, Ancient Greece at the Parthenon, or ecology and the environment in the rain forests of Costa Rica.