Blogger Tony Jones says "Death to Homeschooling!"

I really think he’s confusing his role as a mature believer/Christian-father/primary-educator-of-his-own-children with their role as an immature-believer-possibly-even-unbeliever/child/learner-in-need-of-an-education. How does placing his children in a public school demonstrate how missional he is?

But the whole, brief blog article smacks of an argument from a preclusion, not a conclusive statement born out of a thorough search of the Scripture.

I think all three are viable options depending on a variety of things. In fact, our family as home-schooled, Christian Schooled, and begrudgingly public schooled. All have worked very well for us and we praise the Lord for that. I think Jim’s earliest analysis was pretty good.

Let me add about the quality of education issue. Five years ago we would have never put our children in public School. The Christian School that we use only goes to 8th grade and our daughter graduated. So she is now a senior in the public school and our youngest with autism started in the system at the same time as she.

One thing I learned early on is that most public school teachers are dedicated (not all). They deal with issues that no Christian school teacher has to deal with ( my wife has taught in three Christian Schools, and I have been on staff at two). So when Christian educators exclaim at how well they do compared to the public school, they need to remember that they don’t have to take everyone, and the kids that typically come to the Christian School are pretty bright to begin with. The same would hold true to those transferring from a public school. Generally these are not the best public school students transferring. I know I am speaking in generalities, but I think it is important to note.

There are some excellent Christian schools out there and there are excellent public schools. The two of my four that are in public school are not in an excellent school. But even in a bad public school, the bright kids get a good education, because they take advantage of the programs available. My daughter has a high GPA and an ACT score that will let her in just about any college in the country. She also is in involved in extra cirricular things she could never be involved with. But by far the greatest thing has been our Gospel contacts. They have been through the roof. As a family, we have all had Gospel contacts as a direct result of our kids being in public School.

But I am not saying every parent should put there kids there - we did so begrudgingly. All three alternitives are valid, but it just depends on the situation.

Alan Jacobs at The American Conservative responds to Tony Jones’ post, and characterizes it as “a writer digs up and re-posts a piece from 2005, calls it “Death to Homeschooling”, and then follows it up with two further equally inflammatory posts on the same subject — it’s hard not to think that that someone is doing a Dance of the Seven Veils before a roomful of potential pageviews.”