Most people think because I am anti-government schooling that automatically makes me pro-homeschooling or pro private school. Nothing could be further from the truth.
My experience with most (not all) alternate schooling is that it is even more dangerous because it hires teachers trained in Colleges who use a curriculum that is humanistic. This
means that, unless the prospective teachers have done the extraordinarily hard work of reinterpreting their humanistic training through a Biblical grid, they remain government school teachers even though they are working for a ‘Christian school.’ This results in alternate schools, that are supposed to be teaching a uniquely Christian and World life view to give its imprimatur upon a teacher who is teaching out of a humanist world and life view. Hence, what I am seeing in most the alternate schooling settings that I am exposed to are teachers who, like their government school counterparts, are not epistemologically self-conscious about their Christian faith. The consequence of this is that though they affirm the Christian faith they are still thinking and teaching as those who share many of the premises of the culture they are part of and so they do not have the ability to think, and thus teach in a theo-centric fashion. Christian school administrators hire these people because they likewise don’t know what it means to think with a Christian World and life view.
Another problem with non-government alternate schooling is that the curriculum that is used isn’t particularly ‘Christian.’ After 20 years of homeschooling I can tell you that a great deal of curriculum out there that is advertising itself as Christian isn’t. In many private schools the curriculum that is used is not much better then what might be found in government schools. As a result what happens in many educational venues is that you have people teaching who have not reinterpreted their academic discipline through a Christian grid teaching a curriculum that is not written from a Christian grid. This eventuates in students who are nice (because they are attending a place with a Christian ethos) but who are as captive to the presuppositions of the culture they are part of as their friends who go to government schools.
A third problem with non-government alternate schooling is that the parents, like the teachers mentioned earlier, don’t know what it means to think in a distinctly Christian fashion. This means that they don’t have the ability to hold the feet of rogue teachers and administrators to the fire. Sadly, my experience has been that many parents who home school don’t want to know themselves or don’t see the need for their children to know what it means to think as a Christian. This was brought home to me recently when a parent of one of the students I teach was queried by some of her evangelical friends about why she bothered to send her daughter to my Worldview class to read ‘those books that your daughter will never use.’ (We were reading Schlossberg’s “Idols For Destruction” at the time.) They thought the class didn’t have any practical value and they gave these parents a bit of a hard time. It was brought home again when a major metropolitan area near to me held Worldview conferences for 15-20 year olds for a week during the summers but could only garner 50 or so students every year. This community was well known for it’s Reformed presence but despite bringing in well known quality people to speak at these conferences there was not enough interest to keep the conferences going past a few summers.
A fourth problem with non-government alternate schooling is that for those who are trying to be epistemologically self-conscious about their teaching the support networks are limited. My personal experience over the years was that when I attended what was supposed to be support networks I left more frustrated by what I was hearing in relation to the education going on in homes then I was before I arrived. I quit attending these functions early on because I figured I didn’t need to go looking for frustration when I could find it everywhere around me.
A fifth problem is that there are very few Churches that are willing to stress the importance of decidedly Christian thinking. Parents who do not hear from the pulpit the importance and necessity of being able to think, in concrete terms, as a Christian aren’t likely to see its importance. Parishioners who are not taught in Sunday School or in mid-week settings what Christian History, or Christian Economics, or Christian theory of Law looks like aren’t going to see the issue as that important, and so aren’t going to desire it for their children.
A sixth problem is that most evangelicals really don’t believe in the absolute and exhaustive sovereignty of God. Without that foundational conviction, teaching Christian thinking is really not possible. All of Christian thinking begins and ends with the sovereign God, who because of His omnipotence, all facts find their meaning in Him. Similarly, the failure to see Christ as the risen epistemological Prophet-King, who, because of His work as High Priest, teaches us to think in Redeemed ways leads to a lackluster approach in educational efforts. For to many evangelicals Christ remains the Redeemer of souls but not minds.
Most of my (admittedly anecdotal) experience with the alternate schooling community in the broader evangelical world over the last 20 years has caused me to conclude that most of what is going on in alternate school settings is just another variant of government schooling. I have seen students and parents who don’t care, don’t know, and don’t want to know. I have met very few parents who provide alternate schooling for their children who realize how much work it takes for student and teacher alike to teach their children to become epistemologically self conscious so that they develop the ability to see the culture in which they are living. Even in families that pursue alternate schooling the assumption seems to be that it is not important to think Worldviewishly.
In closing I should add that most of the parents and students I have spoken of above who pursue alternate schooling are swell people. As long as one doesn’t talk about anything important they are delightful conversation partners. Many of them would give you the shirt off their backs to help you. Over the years I have been humbled many times by their kindnesses and support to me and my family. The challenge I have offered here does not speak to their overall niceness but rather to the urgency for them and their children to take every thought to make it captive to Christ.
So you see, the problem that we have in terms of seeing Reformation in our Churches and in our culture is not a problem that is only located in Government schools. The problem includes most of what happens in alternate school settings.
Great analysis. The problem is, as you indicated, an impoverished view of salvation. In most modern Christianity (whatever denomination), as Rushdoony has noted many times, salvation is conceived of as an addition, an extra measure of grace added to nature. But biblical and reformed teaching militates against this, positing that salvation is transformation: grace restores nature.
This is why separation from state schools is not enough; the problem is not merely environmental. We can (and should) be separate from the world, but privation will not produce righteousness. There has to be positive effort on many fronts. This requires a lot of hard work, which is why most people don’t bother.
Bret,
Having strong (W2K, viral, I know!) views on education myself, I can’t help but wonder if at the base of your frustrations are a couple of things: 1) the over-realization of the purpose and function of education, and 2) the necessarily low view or under-realization of the institution of the family. While there is most assuredly an intellectual aspect to it (that is unashamedly undermined in both cult and culture as both take their cues from a modernism that has rendered an epistemological choice between reason and experience), the end result to these presuppositions seems to be an equally aberrant intellectualization of Christian belief. Is the answer to the de-intellectualization of the Christian religion even as it becomes exchanged for the experientialism of revivalism really to indulge the notion that Christian belief is to be farmed out to the classroom instead of the home and church?
In my experience with the Dutch Reformed community (the CRC) that places such a high premium on Xian education there seems to be this notion that what the home should be doing—nurturing faith—can be co-opted by the school. I find that completely, well, sub-Christian. The project of education is primarily intellectual, not affective. It is the role of the home to be primarily affective. My wife and I nurture Christian belief in our kids, not Mr. or Mrs. VanVanderVandeMeer.
In the same way that theonomic thoughts ends up politicizing true religion, I strongly detect on your part this same assumption that results in an intellectualizing of Christian belief. Instead of seeing that Christianity in the business of making believers you seem to see it as a project of making students.
Your hunch that Xian schools are just glorified government schools is correct, at least around here. (I also see it as very much a carried over effort in the effort to maintain a particularly ethnic project, to keep the Dutch migratory culture sifficiently cohered; this against the fact that cultural assimilation has been finalized and renders the effort quite irrelevant. The only thing left to lean on to justify Xian education is that mistake which leads people to believe that Xians doing education is the same thing as Xian education.) But, unlike you, I only see that as a problem because I see no value in paying for a glorified public school education. And I am not compelled to to go on the wild goose-chase to find real Xian education since it doesn’t exist.
And I am not compelled to to go on the wild goose-chase to find real Xian education since it doesn’t exist.
And will never exist until ignorant buffoons such as yourself are shown to be exactly that; Ignorant Buffoons.
Joshua L.
I agree that it is a lot of hard work, and I agree that largely accounts for why people don’t bother, but I would also add that many people don’t bother because they just aren’t aware of the issues. Now, what is maddening is when you try to bring in awareness and you just get blown off.
In order to fix this it would take massive change in the habits of Christians. TV would have to go out the door replaced by books. Leisure time would have to be given over to serious thought. Pop culture radio in the car would have to be replaced by CD’s teaching the Christian faith. There would have to be a willingness on the part of pastors to do worldview catechism.
Now you throw into the mix the incredible pace of life (both parents working long hours) it would take an Exodus like Miracle to change all of this.
But God is able,
How about a book category and start with recommending some places to start aside from the Bible. I see the value in what you say however I’m struggling with formulating an effective curriculum to move forward on training my children. Honestly you’re pointing out stuff but offering solutions that appear to be based on people that are already ‘in the know’
Critical Thinking books
Christian Worldview Books
….and
Thank you for your time.