Posted on 04/10/2012 5:52:48 AM PDT by Kaslin
You're right.
Maybe we can use this to push for more leeway for Christians to organize charter schools.
I understand the legal issues, but when life deals us a lemon, let's at least try to make lemonade with it.
I'll put up with Muslim charter schools if we can get Christian charter schools — and in an inner-city environment with failing schools, having charter schools run by church groups has already been tried and can work. We send our 13-year-old to an independent fundamental Baptist school that has no desire to be connected to vouchers or anything like that. Many people in my church do homeschooling. The simple fact of the matter is not everybody can afford to make the choice we've made.
You will note that I didn’t say “Tax-chick wanted Christian schools”...
There are a number of folks here who did. The threads on charter and home schools for expressly this purpose are archived and accessible.
I’m ok with people teaching their religion in their own private schools. The freedom to choose means exactly that. And yes, you are going to get radical nutballs like this Turk who are going to do bad things with it.
That is the price of freedom. And yes... It’s worth it.
Are there taxpayer-funded Christian public schools? If a Christian organization wanted to start a taxpayer-funded charter school doing the equivalent of what these Muslim schools are doing, would it be allowed?
If yes, then I’m OK with these schools, except possibly the H-1B visas (although it might be difficult to get Turkish language instructors here in the US.)
Are there any schools? No idea. Once you get the government involved, all bets on things like “fairness” and “logic” are pretty much out the window.
Just great( serious sarcasm).
That is the price of freedom. And yes... It’s worth it.
100% agreement.
Yeah, we do that a lot don't we... :-)
The more complicated answer is that state laws differ and some are more restrictive than others. However, there is no federal legal impediment to a group of Christians starting a charter school, if allowed by state law, and teaching traditional American values — sort of a Newt Gingrich or Hillsdale College approach at the pre-college level — as long as religion is not explicitly taught with tax dollars.
Of course, depending on state laws, there are ways to handle that and one of the easiest ways would be for a church to rent space next to the school for voluntary after-school religion classes taught by people who are not on the staff of the charter school. As long as there is no formal or informal pressure to attend the after-school religion classes nothing can be done legally.
One of the best ways to handle this, in my opinion, is to get some members of the local Orthodox Jewish and Roman Catholic community on board and use their board members to make **ABSOLUTELY SURE** the school, during instructional time, is teaching traditional conservative American values and not evangelical Protestantism. In many cities, there are lots of frustrated conservative Catholics who don't like the liberalism of their local Catholic schools and enough Jewish conservatives who would like to help.
The devil is in the details here. A Christian-based charter school will get lots of attention to the curriculum. For example, how will the issue of evolution be handled in a science class? How about the Reformation in an European history class?
If people want an explicit Christian school with explicitly Christian instruction, they need to start one through their church or a group of Christian parents. That cannot and should not be done with tax dollars. But having a public charter school organized along Christian principles much like those of late 1800s America before John Dewey should be legal if handled right.
Please get this article to your state legislature ASAP before they pass the bill. We have to head off stuff like this at the root. You are now informed, so inform your representatives.
That’s kind of how freedom works. You give people choices and some of them are bound to make choices you consider wrong. It’s an either or situation, either you get to make the right choice which means others get to make the wrong choice, or nobody gets to make any choice.
Obviously you are as brilliant as I, and I as you. Have a drink to celebrate our co-brilliance!
I took your sage advice last night. Vodka diet Coke with a side order of something relatively interesting dialed up off of Netflix. ;-)
I had cheap pink wine and “Michael Palin’s Hemingway Adventures” on DVD. (It was filmed sometime before the introduction of the Euro, when he still had hair.)
Next, If Muslims can do this, then so should Christians and Jews. Be Alinsky! Use their own rules against them.
Finally, the very best defense for our nation against the Islamic jihad is to have a nation of citizens who fully understand, fully believe, and are capable of defending their Christian/Jewish faith. This can **never** happen in a godless government school.
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