reflections on a Christian life

When I was growing up, my family figured there were three choices for schooling: public, private and parochial.  For us, that meant there was only one choice.  By the time my eldest was old enough for school there were a few more.  So whereas virtually every kid I knew in church, Christian clubs or camp went to public school, my children would grow up with a mix of Christian friends in public school, Christian school, charter school, private school and home school.

We bought our first home back in the 80s when the Fed was wringing inflation out of the economy with 8-10% mortgage interest rates.  Areas of the city that had been starting to show signs of age were becoming gentrified as new homeowners were trying to stake out a real estate claim and affordability was capped by the size of the payments required.  The local elementary school was considered better than most so we figured we should be able guide our kids through the system.

Maybe I had a bit of a romantic view of the public elementary school as the great melting pot of humanity.  It is one of the few situations in life in which you would not choose with whom you would associate.  You were seemingly randomly selected for a class and then seated in alphabetical order with a shuffling of the room assignments at the beginning of each year.  Other than breakouts for reading, we were all locked in the same room for nine months of the year, the smart ones and lazy ones, the populars and off-beats, the bullies and the clowns, and the kid that stayed back from the prior year who was still in reading group C.

By the time you hit high school, you could build some space by self selecting for honors courses, sports, clubs, etc. and you would soon be an adult, able to chose your workplace, your church and which neighbors you would greet.

What I hadn’t yet understood was that many of my interactions outside of work would be built around my children.  Planning schedules, play dates, special events and just pickups and drop offs would create shared experiences that would connect me to the parents of my kids’ classmates.  In the same way that I grew to have more in common with those parents and other families who were in the public school cycle, there was a remoteness growing with those who made other choices.

Within our church, the home school parents were sharing curriculum tips and arranging field trips and the Christian school parents were pulling volunteer duty in the classes and as hall monitors.  The public school parents could be split into those who saw the educators as threats to be combated with clandestine prayer groups and those who were looking for ways to be involved to promote the welfare of the students and school.

Although we tried to check ourselves for any hints of superiority or judgmentalism, I expect some seeped through – if I felt it from others, they probably felt it from me.  Among our peers, it was as if each parent felt an obligation to justify their schooling decision as being the best.  Updates on kids would include the obligatory endorsement and exclamation of how they were thriving in their environment in ways that couldn’t be imagined in another setting.  What I wanted to communicate was that our choices and experiences may provide some insight into benefits and pitfalls of the public school experience but were not an assessment that it was the right choice for them and their child.

As school age approached for our first born, we were not keen on homeschooling.  Janet had read some Edith Schaeffer book in which she extoled the model of the home as a sanctuary.  The dual role of parent and instructor as well as the lack of separation between home and school seemed to mix things up a little too much to fit that model.  Plus, a few years later, we heard an interview on a Christian radio program in which the “expert” stated, “If you child obeys on command, they are a good candidate for home schooling.”  That line gave us some assurance that we likely avoided a colossal mistake by not attempting that route- somehow none of our kids picked up that gene (maybe it wasn’t modeled to them).

Both parents and children experienced our share of challenges and rewards.  We were convinced that our son’s kindergarten teacher smoked a few too many funny cigarettes in her younger days.  She was more into socialization and discovery than drilling the alphabet and numbers and was butchering the pronunciation of our last name for the first three months.  His buddies at school were an African American kid down the street from us and another massive boy who came from a poorer home and loved coming over to play with our son and his toys.  We eventually moved to the burbs where the majority of the boys were medicated with Ritalin and no one walked to school- mom drove or you took the bus.

Our middle child seemed to have two years of fifth grade and two of seventh.  She bounced to Florida and had to reread “Roll of Thunder hear my Cry” during her 6ixth grade class and returned to upstate NY to find that they would tackle Johnny “Tremain” which she went through last year in FL.

On our move to California, we put our youngest in a Christian school for one year, not knowing what to expect, and then moved her back into the public system.  One thing consistent between parents and real estate agents- they are all proud of their schools.

The toughest transition for all three was between sophomore and junior year of high school when they started hanging around at home on Friday and Saturday nights.  It seemed that with the mobility came the alcohol so childhood friends became “daytime friends”.

Did we do what was best for our kids?  I know we wanted to- but “best” isn’t just a choice.  It is a commitment to a long haul- of experiencing the ups and downs together, evaluating and reevaluating decisions together, talking and praying through the latest disappointment or challenge together.  I hope our kids understood that no matter what, we were in their corner and we were trusting God to take our choices actions and redeem them.