Public School? Private School? Your experiences & what you'd choose

[Heinrich]

Heinrich, I'd actually be really curious to hear your experiences teaching at a public high school (whatever you feel comfortable sharing)! What is the curriculum like in your area and how bad is the "poz"? 

My school is a small, rural one an hour or so outside of Cincinnati. Mostly poor, 99% western European. Fair amount of Novus Ordo Catholics. Fair amount of Evangelicals. Preaching Christ has never been a problem, living the Faith has. Three years ago i was addressed for not calling a transgender freak by her new boy name. Sadly it appears there are two other girls with the demon. There is a lot of cussing and absolutely horrendous dress. Evolution is taught as fact, history curriculum is retarded, AP literature classes read politically motivated books. We have AP calculus, physics, chemistry. Students score well. I do not socialize with my colleagues(or they don't with me). I respect them objectively as dedicated and intelligent(mostly). Outside of classroom 2-3 hours a day is norm for grading or planning. Some do much more than that. I would never send my kids here.

[Heinrich]

I would like to add that a recent convert student of mine went to daily Mass with me last Saturday. His knowledge of the problem in the Church was astounding. He wants to assist at High Mass. I have also had a student ask me about the timeline of the Book of Genesis and the differences between the Divine Comedy and Paradise Lost. Another student will start the diocesan seminary this fall. I talk from time to time on the immutable truths of morality, attempt to insert Truth into culture lessons, e.g. St Martins Day. My upper level German class had as their final unit the theme of "The Environment." Je june and filled with much disclaimers. I have no problem sharing reality. Most of the kids are astounded at what I say. Haven't heard a peep of complaint from the redneck parents. I don't mean redneck as a pejorative since I am one, too.

[GaudeMariaVirgo]

Thanks for the replies all! I'm not a defender of public school by any means (I'm the product of private Protestant schools myself), but the problem is that a lot of this degeneracy is cultural in nature and is heavily pushed by private schools as well, including "Christian" private schools -- the only exception is the schools which are very, very insular and tiny and which refuse to engage with the broader culture to a large extent (and these don't necessarily guarantee a great faith outcome either -- my sense is that a lot of that comes from the family, regardless of which schools your child goes to). Homeschooling has the same issues as tiny/insular schools and (in many cases that I've seen) comes with with a side helping of parental burnout and educational unevenness.

It seems like in our society, we have nothing but flawed options -- there doesn't seem to be any such thing as a solidly moral AND academically high achieving AND well-funded AND culturally engaged AND doctrinally Traditional Catholic School (if there is such a thing, I'd love to hear about it and where it is)! Insofar as parents are forced to choose between a variety of less-than-perfect options, what qualities should they emphasize in a school, not just in family culture/faith formation at home? Should a school come with different considerations, e.g. quality of student body, academic standards, clubs & activities to keep your kids engaged? Or is faith formation paramount at school too? 

[GaudeMariaVirgo]

Lynne, that was a very interesting link and thanks for sharing it! What strikes me about this trans "story" (and the story of Helena that was also mentioned in the video, and a LOT of other trans stories) is that these kids generally seemed to be HEAVILY online and lacking a lot of real-life friends -- there's a lot of crossover between fandom-obsession (Harry Potter, Glee & anime especially), pornography (for boys)/"shipping" (for girls), Tumblr, gaming, and using these as a springboard to connect to weirdos IRL and create a parallel "fantasy life". One commenter on the video even said that her son adopted "trans" as a teen because an older guy had been grooming him on XBox Live, unbeknownst to the parents! (Thankfully the kid was rescued and is now doing okay.) Not surprisingly, a lot of the kids who gravitate heavily toward fandom/online/trans culture are on the autism spectrum or very near it -- there's this lack of ability to distinguish between fantasy and reality, which contributes to both the escapism and the IRL social problems & loneliness that drive the online obsession.

I was in high school when the trans phenomenon really took off, and I've seen it happen to public school kids AND private school kids AND homeschool kids (especially those who do a lot of their schooling online, or who are overly isolated from other kids due to parental overwhelm or paranoia). No matter what school system your child is in, I think the key is to keep them surrounded by a healthy, sane peer group, get them involved in real-life activities, limit their online exposure and facilitate friendships and healthy self-esteem. A parent can do this through homeschool (through co-op/family friendships), religious school or public school, if they play their cards right, but I don't think any parent should assume their kids are immune -- sometimes locking the kid up in a moral bunker and limiting their broader cultural engagement is the opposite of what their kid needs to get real-world feedback and become strong and morally healthy.

I think it's telling that the mom in the video helped her daughter recover by putting her in a "save-the-reef" summer camp where the kids were physically working for 12-hour days and consequently were too exhausted to put any effort into their phony/online personas. Couldn't you make a case for some of these "prestige" or academically aggressive schools doing the same thing? Keeping kids surrounded by reasonably normal (if sometimes irreligious) peers, getting them involved in sports and clubs and all kinds of things to keep them socially engaged, offline, and receiving constant social feedback from real people other than Mom, Dad, and religious authorities?

[james03]

--Local public school. We are in a highly-ranked "destination district" in an affluent Midwest suburb.

True story.  I know someone who lived in a 98% white affluent area in the Bible belt.  Smaller town outside a big city.  Mostly prots.  He put his kids in the public school.  The school had a parents portal so parents could see what was being taught.  His 1st graders had to log into the Student portal to do some homework.  He saw a bunch of fag material.  He checked the parent's portal and it wasn't on there.  So these demon worshipping filth worms deliberately put up deceptive material.  He sent screen caps to every parent in the class, and then went to the school and lit in to them.  NONE of the soccer mom Prot parents backed him up.  He pulled his kids and moved closer to an SSPX school.

DON'T SEND YOUR KIDS TO PUBLIC SCHOOL!  Also note that Greg is posting from England and his experience is different.

You kids will be indoctrinated in being fag and transfender for 12 years, and if they are white, they will be taught how evil it is to be an American.

While their young, you can probably get by with the Catholic school.  Just monitor the religion class closely and make sure you educate them in the Catholic Faith.

For me we homeschooled for most of the time, and then I sent my kids to a hybrid non-denominational Prot homeschool program where you pick the classes.  So they got math, science, and history.  And then we used a Community College when they got older to get college credits.  Never had a problem and my kids are solidly Trad.  I doubt my situation is available to most.  The teachers open carry.

Really you will probably end up home schooling.  Use the Community College when they get older.  It's usually free for high school students.

[james03]

Check out homeschooling.  It is a heck of a lot easier than when we did it.  They have complete online schools now.  So you have a range of options.  Some programs you teach, but your kids mail in or email their tests to the school to be graded.  Or you can go old-school (pun intended).

[GaudeMariaVirgo]

Thanks James! What was your experience like with the Prot co-op? We do have some good private Christian schools in the area (mainly conservative Reformed, i.e. Calvinist). We were considering these as an alternative to public school for when the kids get older/after they've learned apologetics. If you don't mind my asking, how did you prepare your kids to handle a Prot social environment, and is this something you'd recommend in general?

My instinct around the Catholic school is pretty similar to yours, namely that their primary-school program would be great for littler kids but maybe not so much for upper grades. They do have a hybrid program for homeschoolers there, but again, it's very humanities-heavy and lacking in sciences. The community colleges around here are as degenerate as the rest of the schools, but maybe that doesn't matter for one-off classes. Some local Prot colleges such as Calvin U also offer entry-level college courses to homeschoolers, private schoolers & public schoolers.

I'm open to homeschooling if absolutely necessary -- I'm currently homeschooling both the 4-year-old and 2-year-old and plan to supplement their schoolwork at home regardless-- but would really prefer for them to go to school during the day if we can find one that's at all suitable.

[GaudeMariaVirgo]

Also, I'm not trying to sound overly dense with all my questions to you all -- my husband & I are both converts and the only Christians in our families, so we truly are grasping around in the dark when it comes to educating our kids and setting them up for a faithful, successful future.

[Greg]

You really should go and spend time with an older couple with slightly old children.  Very hard to feel your way in the dark. Parenting is much easier if you copy a successful model.  Hard, hard, hard to feel your way and get the parenting optimal.

What I do is try to make religion interesting to my children so the questions and enquiries come from them.  They want to learn.  The most important thing is to give them a good childhood.  People who like their parents tend to adopt their parents creed.  They can see it is a successful creed.

I know Traditional Catholic families where the Dad is a nut and the mother a shrew and the children were well catechised at ten but lapsed by 18 to 20.

The big benefit of hanging around with secular kids is that my children understand how functional and happy their family life is.  They know it is not normal because their schoolfriend are cutting themselves or have eating disorders and all sorts of hang ups.

[Heinrich]

Don't put too much emphasis on math and science. The time displacement sacrificing language, art, music is monumental. If you can get your children to an Algebra 2 level with a biology and Earth science class by 17-18, that's sufficient. If they have this left brain aptitude and desire engineering, medicine, business, etc., they will have time to take these subjects when that time comes. Start them in a foreign language ASAP. I.e., Spanish.

[GaudeMariaVirgo]

I'm curious, why foreign language? Is it for the cognitive benefits or moreso for the skill? Many schools in our area (both our district public schools and some private Christian schools) offer Spanish and Mandarin language immersion programs, which my husband's pretty keen on.

[Heinrich]

Latin or German for cognitive, wherein Latin has a cognitive edge whereas German a practical. Spanish is a no brainer for practicality. Chinese is a fad, like Japanese in 90's. That's my take as a German, English, and Spanish teacher going on 30 years now. If some monolingual Anglo wants to come in here and correct me, please do🔥

[james03]

Thanks James! What was your experience like with the Prot co-op?

 We do have some good private Christian schools in the area (mainly conservative Reformed, i.e. Calvinist). We were considering these as an alternative to public school for when the kids get older/after they've learned apologetics.

The Calvinist part is the problem.  We used a non-denominational school which means the Prots were always squabbling and the school goes easy on "evangelizing", because if they push it, they'll start arguments amongst the prots.  We even had some Orthodox kids attend.  With Calvinist they are more united and more likely to try to indoctrinate your kids.  Also, it has to be a homeschool coop so your kids don't get their "religion" class.

If you don't mind my asking, how did you prepare your kids to handle a Prot social environment, and is this something you'd recommend in general?

I had my kids well trained in apologetics and told them to bring any questions to me.  A few examples, one Prot was talking about Once Saved Always Saved.  My son told him if he really believed it he would immediately commit suicide.  So the kid shut up.  In another instance some Prot kids were squabbling about something in the Bible and said, "Don't ask "son's name", Catholics have an answer to everything".

All in all I found it beneficial.  When they go out in society, they'll face Prots.  My kids think they are all idiots and don't take them seriously.

Actually what caught me off guard was the challenge from atheism.  But I got that corrected.

In short, I would not send your kids full time to a Calvinist school, unless you are really good at teaching apologetics.  It's easy to teach your kids to debate their Prot peers, it's different if it is a Calvinist teacher working to indoctrinate your kid.  I wouldn't do it.

One more funny story.  We tried a novus ordo high school for one year.  My son got kicked out of religion class for calling the religion teacher a heretic.  Proud Papa.  Anyhow, that didn't work out.

[Kent]

OP I realize you were looking for personal experience and I didn't give it in my initial reply, so here's a follow up.

I have a degree in education and went to a school of education. It was not a prestigious school, it was about as boilerplate and non-distinguished as they come. No real reputation to speak of one way or another. This was about ten years ago. The curriculum was thoroughly Marxist. I mean from top to bottom, every reading we were assigned was from Paolo Freire and his disciples. Of course, the word "Marxism" never really surfaced in the classroom or the coursework. But we were all, down to the last student, trained to have a Marxist pedagogy and see the purpose of education in light of advancing the dialectic through social change. This was all done under the banner of programs like "emotional intelligence", "social awareness," and similar terms. 

My experience is not unique. James Lindsay has done a very capable job of demonstrating the complete infiltration of academe by Marxists and their useful idiots (read his work/listen to his podcasts if you don't already).  To be abundantly clear, the issue is not that there is a "Marxist agenda" or even that there is "Marxist propaganda." For those statements to make sense, there would have to be some alternative agenda or propaganda to distinguish from the Marxist stuff.  There isn't. It is a system designed by Marxists, for Marxists, with the goal of producing Marxists. The only question is what kind of Marxist educators your children will have. Will they be more interested in agitating your children to rise up in the race revolution or in the gender revolution? 

I appreciate what Greg has said, but I think it's bad advice if taken as general advice. Some people (Greg appears to be one of them) are indefatigably choleric and can spend all of their waking hours preparing their children to be combative and capable intellectual and moral warriors. The rest of us need to keep our kids a bit safer, because we do not have the necessary personalities or constitutions to spend all of our time deprogramming our children. 

I am very close to a traditional Catholic family with seven children, all of whom were educated in public schools, the youngest of whom graduated about two years ago. Two of them are transgender (one of them a woman trying to become a man who is engaged to a woman), two are non-binary (one of whom is engaged to a woman trying to become a man), one is just a good old fashioned lesbian and then another is bisexual. One of them is a practicing traditional Catholic. These children all grew up attending the Latin Mass, had family rosary every night.  This is a true story. I don't think people appreciate that when they send their children to public schools they are sending them to be indoctrinated in the most anti-Christian, anti-reality cult that has ever existed. You will absolutely have to spend every minute you have with them deprogramming them and telling them that everything they are learning is evil and designed to ruin them.  Their teachers and peers already spend way more time with them than you do. You are at the disadvantage. In almost all cases, choosing to send them anyways will be very rash and imprudent.

And don't you figure a child, especially an older one, is going to wonder what they're doing there? Unless you are ready to undertake this kind of training-- where you make it clear to your kids from day one that they aren't in school to learn from experts and masters, but they're there to learn what the enemy is like and how to fight him-- don't bother. Most parents do not have that kind of time, energy, stamina, or even knowledge. And that's before we even consider whether most kids are up to that task. You cannot just send them there and hope for the best anymore than you can tell your kid to stick their arm in  wood chipper and hope for the best. What you're having them do is designed to ruin them.

Please don't send your kids to public schools.

[james03]

This was all done under the banner of programs like "emotional intelligence", "social awareness," and similar terms.

Almost seems like with your experience you have enough material to do a post on this topic.  As in, how the poison of Marxism is injected.