ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER PROF
This one, though, is pro-home education. I’m not sure I buy his reasoning, though:
April 20th was the anniversary of the Columbine School shootings. In Willerton, Kansas, a number of teenagers have been arrested for allegedly planning a shooting spree at their high school on the anniversary of the Columbine shootings. Why is this sort of thing happening? I think the answer is simple. The post-modern relativism that was the attitude of philosophers 150 years ago has finally worked its way into the fabric of everyday life so that our schools no longer teach or acknowledge the existence of objective moral principles. Parents are afraid to teach their children objective moral principles and are unable to argue with their children as to why the principles are genuinely objective as opposed to mere biases or authoritarian claims.
…Post-modern education teaches that there is no objective right or wrong, but merely an unending set of communities.
…Good education should help students to become Christians. It should help them to find their inclusiveness and membership in the kingdom of God. In this way they can feel secure and have a sense of belonging that does not require anti-social or violent acts against other groups. Naturally, such an education is incompatible with our current system of state-run schools that must remain utterly neutral as to matters of religion. It is for this reason that home schooling, private schooling and a public voucher system would have superior results to the current system in which public education cannot address the moral and religious needs of students. Nor can parents hope to compete with the combined time and force of both schools and media that are constantly giving students the relativistic message.
I don’t believe it is the g-schools’ job to teach “moral principles.” That’s what parents are for. The schools should teach the basics– the 3Rs and civics. The fact that they’re not doing that job well (if at all) has led many of us to follow the home education route.
Yeah, I’m sure homeschooling enables one to pass along a religious world-view to one’s kids more easily than if they’re sent to the local prison school. But, sometimes, homeschooling enables the exact opposite. The public schools and community activities around here are blatantly Christian. If you’re of a minority religion, or no religion at all, homeschooling might be the only way to pass along your values, objective morality or not.
3 Responses to “ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER PROF”
 Comment by COD April 22nd, 2006 at 3:38 pm |
//Good education should help students to become Christians// This is where he goes very wrong. Good education should give our youth the critical thinking skills necessary to make an informed decision about what they believe. If the goal of the education to force a particular viewpoint, it’s not education, it’s indoctrination. |
 Comment by speedwell April 23rd, 2006 at 7:49 am |
I merely stop to mention Joseph Fletcher, Christian theologian and writer of an influential little Christian book called “Situation Ethics.” I start to discuss him and his religious ideas whenever I’m stuck on a bus with a bunch of noisy praise-the-Lord types, and enjoy the silence after the heads explode. |
 Comment by Karen April 23rd, 2006 at 9:30 pm |
Daryl, Every one of us has a set of moral principles. There is no way to seperate them out of your brain when you get in front of a classroom. The things you say, they way you choose to say them, the things you leave unsaid: all are choices guided at least in part by your moral principles. As a homeschooler, that’s one of the reason I homeschool. I want my son soaking up MY moral principles–not those of an NEA hack, sports-IS-life coach, or over-sexed, acquisitive “friend.” |