Dear wife has been wanting to home-school for the past several years. I've resisted. Gradually, though, I have started to see the sense in teaching our children ourselves. Over the past thirteen years, we've had both good and bad experiences with schools, public and private. I don't think the schools or the experiences have changed as much as our perception. For me, the tipping point was this past fall when our four school-aged children got the flu. It turns out that the school district has a rule that, if the children miss three or more days of school, they have to go to the doctor before returning to school. If not, the parents will be fined $350 per child. Well, three of our children met their criteria, so that would have been $1050. The cost to take three well-children to the doctor was $75. Begrudgingly, we took the children to the doctor. The timing was especially difficult as we had just replaced the transmission in the minivan and Christmas was fast approaching. The school, of course, was unswerving, bureaucratic. And we're lucky. We have health insurance. What happens to the families less fortunate than we are? Perhaps typical of men, my opinion about homeschooling didn't change until public schooling hit my pocketbook and I felt the yoke of tyranny.
Since then, nearly every day something has happened that has reaffirmed my opinion about homeschooling. And nearly every day, I've thought about blogging about the most recent episode that tips the scales even more in favor of taking over the education of our children. Dear wife tells me that she, too, wants to blog about homeschooling. I think, though, that she wants to talk in more general terms, most likely in terms of how it relates to Christianity in particular. I'm thinking more about some ongoing, short, anecdotal posts. I think the topic allows plenty of room for discussion and comment.
Today's anecdote relates to our oldest, a high-school senior, and his upcoming college decision. Regarding his status, we have reason to be thankful. He's been accepted to five universities, two public and three private. He's also been offered scholarships by all three private schools, making their cost on par with the state schools. He's leaning toward one of the state schools, my father's alma mater. He's also been accepted to main campus of the university where I got my undergraduate degree, a school with a much venerated octogenarian football coach. But, barring making the decision for him, we're hoping he chooses one of the private schools. We are particularly interested in a Catholic school recommended by the Cardinal Newman Society. The whole college preparation and selection process has been long and exhausting. Our son has been resistant to our guidance, but our perseverance has largely paid off. His grades have improved. He put some effort into his SAT and essay, and now he has options. The problem is that, for the second time, he came home telling us that his high-school teachers were trying to persuade both him and his classmates that public universities are better than private colleges. Not only do I disagree, but they are specifically undermining what we are trying to tell our child. If we were homeschooling, this would not be an issue.
Some people might say, "Sure, that's why you want to home school. You're afraid of having your children exposed to different points of view." This is not a fair criticism. My concern is not exposure to a variety of opinions, but exposure to only one viewpoint—that of mainstream secular society. Furthermore, the prevailing opinion is presented with no room for debate. For example, in regard to the private versus public universities debate, any discussion of character education is off limits. The prevailing wisdom is that character education is the parents' job. The status quo in university education today is a technical education peppered with an indoctrination into the sacred cows of modern academia—feminism, civil rights, and liberalism. Though these issues may be important, they do not fit under the rubric of a traditional liberal arts education because open debate and exploration of the truth are not allowed. Don't believe me? Try going into a Women's Studies class and talking about the drawbacks of daycare. The same can be said, with scarce exceptions, for any of these curricula. Furthermore, the gist of these courses carries forward to the social milieu of these universities, from COED dorms to house parties. On most secular campuses (and, to be fair, in many religious schools), mainstream secular opinion is as sure to mold the student as the Colorado River was once poised to form the Grand Canyon.
Perhaps a specific example would be instructive. I went to a large, state university during the Congressional debate on censorship of rock music. From a 400-level course (which many of the Grad Students in my major audited), I was acquainted with a graduate student who was teaching Freshman English. He asked his students to write a pro/con paper on the music censorship debate. He had around 30 students in his class. Troubled by his students' rigid stance on the topic, he advised that anyone arguing for censorship would be more likely to get an A. His papers came back, and to his great disappointment, all 30 came back against censorship. The point is not that censorship is good, but that these students were incapable of perspective-taking or arguing from another point of view. My point is that these skills are unlikely to be learned at a large university, especially in a predominately technical emphasis of study.
I think the problem of conceptual rigidity and lack of character education is epidemic in our society. I saw an example the other night while flipping through the channels. The show was Private Practice. Yes, of course this was merely a T.V. show, but it was quite believable. In my experience, many doctors really do act like this. In the show, two doctors were struggling with a romantic entanglement because the female doctor's best friend was the male doctor's ex-wife. In other words, these were highly educated people struggling with an issue that they should have understood in 10th grade--you don't double-cross your friends or throw salt in the wounds of break-up. These were characters with 12+ years of technical higher education, but who lacked a basic education in character development. In my view, all the money in the world, all the high-end jobs, cannot possibly make up for the interpersonal mayhem and emptiness that invariably follow in the wake of spiritual poverty. No, I'm not arguing for Bible-college in lieu of science education, but I am asserting that values are the most important facet at all levels of education, from elementary to post-doctoral.
So, in response to my son's Chemistry teacher: Yes, education is what the student makes of it. But a real education is more than understanding electron configurations, the most important aspects of education are the values the student learns in the process. As Christian parents, it is our responsibility to provide our son with some religious instruction. We would also like him to continue his studies. Personally, I would like it if he chose to take a few courses in religion and ethics while at college. I might recommend that he take a course in Eschatology or Exegesis or Theology. It is my hope that he will develop an understanding of his faith commensurate intellectually with his expertise in his chosen field of study. In retrospect, our eldest may have been best guided in this direction by a course of home-study rather than a public-school education.
