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The revolt of the Christian home-schoolers is a multi-part dive into the changes people are making in the schooling of their children.
Today's first part focuses on a couple in Loudoun County, VA, where my wife grew up . . . a long time ago. It's a long article so I'll list a few excerpts, below.
"Aaron and Christina had never attended school when they were children. Until a few days earlier, when Round Hill Elementary held a back-to-school open house, they had rarely set foot inside a school building. Both had been raised to believe that public schools were tools of a demonic social order, government “indoctrination camps” devoted to the propagation of lies and the subversion of Christian families."
"Christina and Aaron were supposed to advance the banner of that movement, instilling its codes in their children through the same forms of corporal punishment once inflicted upon them. Yet instead, along with many others of their age and upbringing, they had walked away. Their decision to send Aimee to the neighborhood elementary school ... had contributed to a bitter rift with their own parents, who couldn’t understand their embrace of an education system they had been raised to abhor."
"Among conservative Christians, home schooling became a tool for binding children to fundamentalist beliefs they felt were threatened by exposure to other points of view. Their own children ... knew little of their reasons for abandoning home schooling: the physical and emotional trauma of the “biblical discipline” to which they had been subjected, the regrets over what Aaron called “a life robbed” by strictures on what and how they learned."
"The Bealls knew that many home-schooling families didn’t share the religious doctrines that had so warped their own lives. But they also knew that the same laws that had failed to protect them would continue to fail other children. “It’s specifically a system that is set up to hide the abuse, to make them invisible, to strip them of any capability of getting help. And not just in a physical way,” Christina said. “At some point, you become so mentally imprisoned you don’t even realize you need help.” . . . “The use of the rod is for the purpose of breaking the child’s will,” stated the handout that they bent over together in the church. "
The article describes the punishment these home-schoolers were to administer (inflict?) on kids, with rods, switches, belts, etc, essentially beating the life out of kids. They grew up believing they could procreated in numbers to out-populate Muslims and atheists, that the world was only 8,000 years old and that Noah actually herded dinosaurs onto the ark. I just shake my head when I read stuff like this. There is info in the article about some of the personalities in the Christian home schooling universe, complete with info on one of the founders of the movement who's now disgraced in a sex scandal -- imagine that. Turns out that the little girl in the story THRIVED in the local public school where her poor reading skills were improved and quickly came to love going to school.
I never did like the home-schooling trend, I just don't see any way it can compete with the breadth and depth of all that public schools offer.
This link should get you into the story, which is long and also has a 30-minute audio file. https://wapo.st/3C9JHch
Oh, Lord. The vast majority of homeschoolers are NOT like this. There will always be extremists on both sides of things. I would venture a guess that statistically, the percentage of homeschooled kids abused would not even hold a candle to the percentage of public school kids abused.
I will also add that elementary kids who are “behind” almost always catch up by 5th or 6th grade. The brain isn’t ready for formal learning until around age 7, and this is when kids (homeschooled or not) who are “behind” will start making better strides toward whatever is deemed proper for that grade level.
The subtitle of the story says: "They were taught that public schools are evil. ..."
The story then goes on to say: "Both had been raised to believe that public schools were tools of a demonic social order, government “indoctrination camps” devoted to the propagation of lies and the subversion of Christian families."
When did public schools become so "evil" and why? Public schools (and by default the government) became evil, to some, in the 1970s when schools were desegregated and Black students bused to mostly White schools to level the playing field and assure most kids were treated equally towards getting a good education. As is so often the case, racism was / is at the core of many ills in our country. I remember parking lots full of school buses being set afire by opponents.
Who is calling public schools evil? Mostly christians and evangelicals, the christian nationalists who want to convert our nation into a theocracy. Meet the new bunch, same as the old bunch, i.e., the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) which has been the home church of the KKK for generations, and they're still at it. They're among the screamers at school board meetings denouncing Critical Race Theory, which I don't support and isn't being taught anywhere. But the truth hurts that Blacks have been horribly screwed over, they don't want to be reminded of it or have their kids taught the truth of our own history.
This is derived from the GOP's Southern Strategy that goes back to Nixon. This form of political mendacity holds that gaining White votes by being anti-Black had to switch from overt racism (shouting the N word) to more covert means via abstract language. Thus we get the dog whistle racism that's now prevalent. Here's a short video where the father of the Southern Strategy, Lee Atwater, explains it in his own words.
It’s evil bc it contributes to the breakdown of the family unit. Kids are exposed to all kinds of things from peers and adults alike. These kids are gone from home for 7-8 hours a day to be raised in their most formative years by strangers. Mothers have gone to work and the kids end up in after school care programs to turn the day into more like 10-11 hours out of the home. Now we have them literally indoctrinating kids with revisionist history, gender nonsense, and exposing them to sexual content/topics at young ages. Do I need to go on?
The subtitle of the story says: "They were taught that public schools are evil. ..."
The story then goes on to say: "Both had been raised to believe that public schools were tools of a demonic social order, government “indoctrination camps” devoted to the propagation of lies and the subversion of Christian families."
When did public schools become so "evil" and why? Public schools (and by default the government) became evil, to some, in the 1970s when schools were desegregated and Black students bused to mostly White schools to level the playing field and assure most kids were treated equally towards getting a good education. As is so often the case, racism was / is at the core of many ills in our country. I remember parking lots full of school buses being set afire by opponents.
Who is calling public schools evil? Mostly christians and evangelicals, the christian nationalists who want to convert our nation into a theocracy. Meet the new bunch, same as the old bunch, i.e., the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) which has been the home church of the KKK for generations, and they're still at it. They're among the screamers at school board meetings denouncing Critical Race Theory, which I don't support and isn't being taught anywhere. But the truth hurts that Blacks have been horribly screwed over, they don't want to be reminded of it or have their kids taught the truth of our own history.
This is derived from the GOP's Southern Strategy that goes back to Nixon. This form of political mendacity holds that gaining White votes by being anti-Black had to switch from overt racism (shouting the N word) to more covert means via abstract language. Thus we get the dog whistle racism that's now prevalent. Here's a short video where the father of the Southern Strategy, Lee Atwater, explains it in his own words.
I followed your link, then followed a link within the article that took me to an official Pennsylvania government website. It claims that 1 in 10 public school students are victims of sexual misconduct by teachers (the article clearly defines sexual misconduct.) I'm having a really hard time believing that. And I didn't find anything solid to support your claim about 100x.
I'm no cheerleader for today's public schools, but those figures just don't seem believable. Maybe i just don't want to believe them. I'm open to more evidence though.
I think it was 3 times over 7 years that parents came to my office to triumphantly annouce that they would begin homeschooling their child. I'm not sure what they expected me to say, but it seemed as if they expected me to beg them not to go. Instead I would break into a broad smile and say, "Thank you! Is there anything I can to expedite the withdrawal process?"
Of course! They still have to pay tens of thousands each year in school taxes to fund your salary!
Location: When you take flak it means you are on target
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The right wing christian madrasas and home schooling by religious zealots are designed as places to isolate, indoctrinate, brainwash and groom children into the parents perverse lifestyle choices. It causes educational damage and few parents are qualified to actually teach.
These "voucher" programs, promoted largely by republican christian extremists, are designed to siphon public funds into discriminatory religious schools, as a sidestep around mixing secular public schools and religion. They all need to be outlawed. Including the catholic indoctrination centers that pose as schools.
Granted there are a few legitimate "charter" schools for exceptional students who can't receive the individual or advanced treatment in public classes. My town has an excellent public charter school that is always one of the best in the state.
The Supreme Court ruled in Wisconsin v. Yoder that religious freedom (for the parents) trumps child welfare.
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And I didn't find anything solid to support your claim about 100x.
