Archived June 23, 2009

Archived News - October through December 2008 

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Call to Dunkirk
Ministry Issues Call to Exit Public Schooling
by Rev. Chuck Huckaby, Associate Editor
The Christian Observer
Posted December 29, 2008

Excerpt: The Call is to take whatever steps are necessary to deliver our children from the public school system as quickly as possible and make sure they are receiving a Christian education instead of the continual humanist indoctrination that has passed for education for over a generation.

Includes "The Call to Dunkirk," YouTube video with Rev. E. Ray Moore, Bruce Shortt, and Rev. Voddie Baucham.

    
New Leader at Alliance for the Separation of School and State
by Bob Dill
The Times Examiner
Posted December 3, 2008

Watching Out for Her Little Ones

Belgium and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child

by Peter Kamakawiwoole

ParentalRights.org
Posted December 15, 2008

There's plenty in this article that is even more frightening than government control of education in Belgium, but we should keep in mind that when parents refuse to let the state educate their children, they keep the upper hand in their children's rearing and keep the state's hunger for control in check.

Excerpt: Unlike their American counterparts, however, Belgium’s “private schools” are not strictly run by private individuals, but receive subsidies from the government, along with significant oversight from national and local education ministries. All schools - even within the home - are required to teach children “respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms and the cultural values of the child and others,” under Article 29 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Public, private, and home schools are all inspected by the government to insure compliance, and disobedience could result in the children being placed in a school of the government’s choosing.

Unfortunately, Belgians are discovering too late that it is difficult to rein in the government once it gains power in all schools.

Home-Schooling: Testing Proves Success of Grads

by Michael Smith

The Washington Times

Posted November 30, 2008

Homeschool college freshman outscore Harvard seniors on civics test

Excerpt: The test results do show clearly what happens when you compare the best with the best: The best homeschooled students systematically outperform the best non-homeschooled students. This success did not happen automatically. It happened because tens of thousands of dedicated parents made tremendous sacrifices to educate their children. 

No School Like Home

by Jessica Shepherd

The Guardian

Posted August 19, 2008

Home education, long dismissed as a hippy option, can be 'astonishingly efficient', says a new study. Jessica Shepherd meets the children who don't go to school.

Excerpt: Home education is just an extension of good parenting, Thomas and Pattison argue. "School itself necessarily curtails such parental contribution." Why, they ask, do we as a society assume that formal learning needs to take over beyond the age of five? "There is no developmental or educational logic behind the radical change in pedagogy from informal to formal when children start school," they say.

Contrary to expectations, the home-educated children had no difficulty entering formal education, the authors found. The informal curriculum is "as good a preparation as any" for college, university or academic correspondence courses, they say. "The young people had the personal skills to make the transition with apparent ease." 

Training the Soul: The Chesterton Academy
BreakPoint
Posted November 17, 2008

Excerpt: In all seriousness, as you’ve probably gathered by now, something special is going on here. This is the kind of education that our students so desperately need—one that seeks to develop both their body of knowledge and their moral intelligence, and to strengthen their bonds with their family and their society, instead of treating them as isolated and self-serving units.

The results of government schooling - You must have a paid subscription to The Times-Gazette to view this article
by Jacob Hornberger
The Times-Gazette
Posted November 11, 2008

Excerpt: Advocates of government schooling claim that parents are not competent to make educational decisions for their children. That raises an obvious question: Why not? Aren't most parents products of public schooling? If public schooling has produced a nation of adults who lack the competence to guide their children's education, why do we want to continue a system that is likely to produce the same result?

'No excuses' schools are getting results
by George Will

Charleston Daily Mail

Posted September 15, 2008

The Cristo Rey model actually helps poor kids

Excerpt: All the students work somewhere - at more than 100 companies and law firms - one day a week, at jobs paying $20 an hour, the money going directly to the school, covering 70 percent of its costs…

CRJHS can have its work program, its entirely college preparatory courses…, its zero tolerance of disorder…, its enforcement of decorum… and its requirement that every family pay something, if only as little as $25 a month - it can have all this because it is not shackled by bureaucracy or unions, as public schools are...

Close the Government Schools
by Vin Suprynowicz
LewRockwell.com
Posted September 6, 2008

Note: Close the government schools? That's not quite what this author is saying. Instead, he's showcasing the possibilities of publicly funded private schooling, which, of course, is not private schooling. There's no doubt that children should not be attending dangerous, academically backward schools. Are vouchers and school choice programs the answers -- or do we have the imagination and the means to do better?

After reading Mr. Suprynowicz's article, take a look at some of our articles about the dangers of state funding of education. We can do better.

You may also want to read the article "Education vs. Schooling" inspired by Michelle Rhee's efforts in Washington, D.C.

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