Why Public School?

Before you even being to scour this article as ammunition to use against all your friends who home school or have their kids in christian school, you can find the exit and see your way out before I sit on you. :) Before you even begin to scour this article to bolster your artillery as to WHY you keep your kids at home or WHY you send them to christian school, you too can find your way out before I sit on you :) For five seconds, let's just all lay down our weapons and take off our shoes as we tread on sensitive and IMPORTANT territory.

You should know I am in my seventh year of home schooling, I attended Christian school my entire education, and now am half way through my third year of having some kids in public school. My best friend, who happens to be my sister, home schools. My eldest daughter will attend Christian school next year, my son will begin his six year journey in public school next August, and at any given moment, Mark and I are completely open to changing the education path of each our children based on their specific academic, emotional, physical, and spiritual needs. We do not swear allegiance to any ONE type of education. We have seen up close and personal all the pros and cons to each type of system, and we FIRMLY believe each of our children are exactly where they need to be....today.

In order for me to fully release the care and keeping of Katie, the Lord, through a very long and personal journey, had to pry Katie from my almost cold, dead hands. You see, I had a control issue. It was this sleeping giant in my life that I didn't know existed until I had to let Katie go. Until the Lord made it ABUNDANTLY clear that YES, He was asking me to let Katie go to public school. And He used all kinds of circumstances to land me in this position. The story is sweet and sad and hard and stunningly SUCH A GOD THING!

With that said, the entire first year Katie was in public school in Kansas, I dealt with this overwhelming sense of guilt and shame.  After being completely engulfed in the home school movement I felt I had committed the greatest atrocity ever by throwing her to the pack wolves of public school. I just knew putting her in public school would automatically make her compromise everything we had fought to instill in her, and bankrupt her of every good characteristic she possessed. I just knew she would be a sexually compromised, prodigal-daughter by the time she completed third grade. Y'all, I do not joke. These lies nearly suffocated my heart. Some how, public school had become the enemy, and sending Katie made me the devil in disguise.

During this first year, I found such enormous freedom in reading stories about children who had successfully navigated the public schools and were changed, while simultaneously changing the sphere of people around them. I CLUNG to the stories. I began to pray in a way I had never known. Every second of every day for months, I prayed without ceasing for Katie. And the MOST beautiful thing happened before my eyes; we changed... Mark, Katie, and I being the most heavily impacted by the change.

Kids are mean. It's just reality. Katie had grown up in a very soft environment. Gentle friends, gentle adults in her life and her discipline, while not always comfortable, always ended in restoration. Every day for several months, Katie came home crying. Every day she seemed to be the victim of "bullying" and the victim of "my teacher yelled at me!" Every day we were given a very clear opportunity to process with Katie the uncharted waters she was surfing. Katie was learning first hand how NOT soft people and adults can be. While it was crushing to see her hurt; we, she, I learned so much. We learned that we cannot label every act of unkindness as bullying. We learned that we cannot control other people, only our responses. We learned that every unkind act is an overflow of insecurity and brokenness. We learned in a up close and personal way that hurt people, hurt people. And whether we like it or not, Katie's skin thickened. She learned how to function with hard people and in hard places, and consequently her heart has developed into one of the most other's focused hearts I know. Can home school hearts and christian school hearts develop into "other's focused" without the harsh realities of unkindness? Absolutely. But at some point in each child's life they will encounter cruelty. They will need to know how to appropriately address it, ignore it or confront it. Public school offers us that opportunity EVERY.SINGLE.DAY. I love that. Because when the rubber meets the road my kids will be doing life with broken people EVERY.SINGLE.DAY when they leave the protection of our home. (SHEESH, they have to do life with broken people INSIDE our home every.single.day. Me, the most broken of all). We get to debrief in the most beautiful and raw way every afternoon. We get to talk about circumstances that they have ACTUALLY walked through, not circumstances they might hypothetically walk through someday.  This is huge, because sometimes the reality of a situation verses the hypothetical of a situation conjurers up very different emotions and responses. The door that public school has opened has allowed us to explore things I could NEVER make up on my own. For that I am grateful.

In one day alone, I had to define pervert, explain why sexy is only a safe and sweet word between a husband and a wife, hash through the details of drug usage and needles, and wash hair for lice. YES! All in a day's work of public-schooling :) But I wouldn't trade it for ANYTHING!

I could write for days all the wonderful, hard, delicate situations our kids have already encountered. I could tell you ALL the ways the Lord has grown them up physically, academically, emotionally, and YES, SPIRITUALLY!  I cherish every moment of debrief as an opportunity TEACH, instill, and REMIND my kids of the WAY bigger picture.

At the end of the day, we aren't consumed with our children being Rhode Scholars and top of the class brain-O's. We want their education experience to assist US (Mark and I) in encouraging them in the ONE thing we preach every day in our home; love people well, they are the only eternal thing.

Public school has done that for us. And it might not do it for everyone, and that is SO ok. But this post is for the parents struggling with guilt and shame, believing the lie that God has left the public school while their child sits in a public school desk. I will testify from the deepest places of my soul; HE HAS NOT LEFT THE PUBLIC SCHOOL. He will NEVER leave the precious corridors of your child's heart. Therefore, God's presence in the public schools today is everlasting to everlasting, JUST LIKE HIM!

Oh friends, take off the guilt and shame. 'Shake It Off' as Taylor would have you. Rest. Our God is moving.. He always is. And yes, He is moving in the public schools too!!

~Sara
*Warning*
Please do not share this article if your intent is to harm someone with the opposite educational choice as you. Only share this article in a spirit of encouragement! It was written from that place. And if you misuse it in anyway, I will hunt you down and sit on you! :) Big peace and lurve from the doublewide....