Evangelical education

EDITOR'S NOTE: Cassie Fuerst was a religion reporter at the Columbia Missourian for two years and just completed a Master of Arts program in journalism at MU. In the 2005-06 school year, she experienced Christian schools first-hand as an English teacher at Heritage Academy.

One early spring morning, Brad Clemons introduced the students in his 11th grade English class at Christian Fellowship School to “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” a poem by T.S. Eliot.

The epic monologue begins with a quotation from the Inferno passage of Dante’s “The Divine Comedy” in which the hero, wandering in a “dark wood,” loses his way and enters the gates of hell.

Eliot’s protagonist is a man trapped in his own hell.

Gripped by fear and anxiety, frustrated by the social demands of the modern world, Prufrock suffers from shallowness of soul and is living a life without meaning.

Clemons’ purpose is not only to teach his students a classic of 20th century poetry, but also to show them what a life without Christ would be like.

He takes his place at the front of the room, before shelves lined with volumes of Shakespeare, Steinbeck and textbooks published by Bob Jones University Press, and begins reading this passage:

“There will be a time, there

will be time.

To prepare a face to meet

the faces that you meet;

There will be time to

murder and create,

And time for all the works

and days of hands

That lift and drop a question

on your plate

A time for you and a time for me,

And a time yet for a hundred

indecisions,

And a hundred visions and revisions,

Before the taking of toast and tea.”

Some students offered little but blank stares in response to Clemons’ impassioned reading. Then a voice sliced through with a note of uncertainty: “Do you agree with this poem?”

“If you view the world without God, you have to come to the same conclusion,” Clemons said. “Eliot was a bitter young guy in his 20s. He didn’t get saved until in his 30s.”

When it opened in 1981, the Christian Fellowship School at was reserved for the children of the church’s congregants. Since opening its doors to other denominations in 1992, the school has attracted students from 40 different churches.

One of a dozen Christian schools in Columbia, Christian Fellowship has nearly 300 students in kindergarten through grade 12.

Like all Christian schools, education mixes with the realm of the sacred at Christian Fellowship. Parents, faculty and most of the students regard learning — from history to the humanities — through a lens tinged with an evangelical hue.

Yet, the principles at the heart of the curriculum at Christian Fellowship mean many parts of the world remain in shadows for its graduates. For the nine students who walked across the sanctuary to accept their diplomas last month, young men and women who have been taught to present a Christian face to those they meet along the way, graduation means an opportunity for, as Eliot put it, “a hundred visions and revisions.”

On a sweltering day in August, I was filled with trepidation as I waited in a classroom at Heritage Academy, a Christian school housed at Grace Bible Church, on Paris Road. I had been hired to teach junior and senior English at Heritage.

With a bachelor’s degree in the subject, I was confident in my ability to discuss great works of literature.

I was unsure, however, of how to relay this information in a Christian way, especially when it came to the many great literary minds that held a decidedly non-Christian view of the world. So, when seven students settled in for that first class, a mix of juniors and seniors, looks of expectation on their faces, I began in prayer. It wasn’t required, but like a pastor donning his robes before the service, prayer seemed like a good way to sanctify what followed. It became a daily routine.

Christian school teachers are routinely required to sign a general statement of belief, both as a way to monitor adherence to Christian orthodoxy and as a constant reminder to live out their faith in their students’ eyes.

The statement I signed at Heritage required that I believe the Bible to be the “inspired, infallible, authoritative, inerrant word of God,” as well as in “the necessity of regeneration by the Holy Spirit for salvation because of sinfulness of human nature.”

Many Christian schools require a similar commitment from their students’ families. Christian Fellowship, for instance, requires that at least one parent be a self-proclaimed Christian.

Linda Schirmer and her husband sent their son, Nate, to Heritage Academy because they believe education is never neutral and should always be value-oriented.

“We wanted our son to be taught from a Christian world view,” Linda Schirmer said. “We wanted him to see God’s perspective, not man’s, whether it be math, science or literature.”

In 2002, according to the latest statistics from the U.S. Department of Education, there were 27,000 private schools in the United States; 77 percent of them had a religious affiliation.

In the early 19th century, public schools in America routinely incorporated religion, including prayer and Bible study, in the classroom. In response to the conservative Protestant values adopted by public schools at the time, the Catholic Church began to form its own education system in the 1840s.

The modern Christian school movement flourished in the late 1970s and early 1980s in response to the court-ordered secularization of public schools. Some of the earliest Protestant schools were formed to get around laws requiring that public schools be racially integrated. Although segregation is no longer an aim, Christian schools as a whole remain predominately white. Heritage Academy has more than 75 students in grades K-12, including one African-American and one Asian.

The federal government does not require Christian schools to be accredited, nor do many states, including Missouri. The largest Christian accreditation agency is the Association of Christian Schools International, which works with more than 5,400 schools — 55 of them in Missouri — in 107 countries.

While Heritage Academy, which opened in 2002, is not accredited, Christian Fellowship School adheres to standards set by the much smaller International Christian Accrediting Association, which was developed at Oral Roberts University. The association had accredited 120 schools — including five in Missouri — as of 2005-06, most of them of the charismatic and Pentecostal variety.

While the International Christian Accrediting Association does require that schools teach spiritual development programs, teachers do not have to be certified.

Tom Agnew, the director, said he drew upon his experiences as a public school teacher to work through the standards for the private Christian schools.

“Public schools helped me to see that Christian schools need to have standards, and that can only happen through accreditation,” Agnew said. “I would only recommend a Christian school that was accredited.”

Elementary school education at Heritage Academy costs $180 per class, while parents of students in the higher grades pay $237 per class per semester. Students typically enroll in four classes per semester. The cost of education at Christian Fellowship School starts at nearly $3,000 for kindergartners and rises to $4,560 a year for grades 7 through 12.

At both schools, the tuition does not include the cost of textbooks, many of which are published by Bob Jones University Press.

Anyone familiar with Christian schooling knows the Bob Jones brand. Four generations of Joneses have stood at the helm of the fundamental college in Greenville, S.C., which over the years has injected itself in the public spotlight by proclaiming God’s judgment on a variety of institutions and individuals, including political candidates. The university launched its book publishing business in 1974.

Both Heritage Academy and Christian Fellowship also use texts published by Beka Books, which according to its Web site, strives to teach today’s Christian school student “the accumulated wisdom of the past from God’s point of view ... .”

Some Christian schools struggle to offer a broad range of classes. Lower enrollments mean smaller class sizes, but it also means that the number of electives offered are limited. Christian Fellowship has just 60 secondary education students, not enough to offer classes in subjects such as accounting, shop and sociology.

Heritage Academy and Christian Fellowship do, however, make the development of their students’ faith a priority. Christian Fellowship requires its student to take a Bible class every year, while Heritage Academy offers an elective that explores how Christians should view different world philosophies. Seniors at Christian Fellowship delve into other religions, as well as current events, including discussion of issues related to homosexuality.

Scott Williams, Christian Fellowship’s principal, said: “We try to help students come to grips with why they believe what they do so they don’t leave with simple, pat answers or just their parents’ religion.”

Clemons has been teaching English to grades 9 through 12 at Christian Fellowship School for two years, following a stint with Pettis County R-V schools in Hughesville.

“As a Christian I felt like I couldn’t tell the truth,” Clemons said. “I couldn’t share in the public schools.”

At Christian Fellowship, parents sometimes feel Clemons shares too much. He introduces his students to a wide swath of literature. The content may include four-letter words and abundant violence. But, Clemons believes it is necessary.

“I don’t want the first time the students go through these ideas to be with an atheist in a secular university,” Clemons said. “I get a comment every once in a while from a parent.”

While literary discussions in Christian school English classes typically address the author’s relationship with God, textbook publishers often censor questionable material. The book I use, from Bob Jones University Press, warns of the dangers of Mark Twain, citing his recurring themes of defiance of authority and later hostility toward Christianity.

Tere DeWitt has been a math teacher for nearly two decades at the university, community college and public school levels. While she enjoys sharing her faith with students, math is a difficult subject to teach from a Christian perspective. In history class, the Catholic Church and the Protestant Reformation are emphasized more than in public schools, and often focus on geographic areas, such as the Middle East, where biblical events took place. In Laurie Wallace’ biology class at Heritage Academy, creation is taught alongside evolution, with special emphasis on God’s role in the universe’s order.

“When we look at the internal structure of a mammal, she keeps reminding us how awesome God is for making all that, you know,” David Moser, an 11th-grader in Wallace’s class, said. “It’s just cool to be reminded of that in class.”

While DeWitt has yet to find a decent Christian math book, faith pops up naturally in her class, such as the time a student used a whale in a problem, which led to a discussion of Jonah’s ordeal.

“The kids live out their faith in their daily lives,” she said.

Indeed, DeWitt says that Heritage Academy is the first place she has taught where the students thank her after every class.

“I have a master’s degree,” DeWitt shares. “In a public school I’d make around $40,000, but I’d be miserable. There is a significant financial cost, but the satisfaction of teaching here is worth it.”

Both principals recognize that some people, both within the Christian school realm and outside, question the students’ readiness for the world beyond school, if their innocence and lack of experience in a larger world will hold them back or how they would cope in public universities, where the world is not as managed or as well-mannered.

For example, at Heritage Academy, disciplinary problems are literally nonexistent, aside from the occasional talking out of turn and slight violations of the dress code.

“Our problems include chewing gum and talking out of term,” Clemons said. “In a public school classroom, I had students cussing me out.”

I grew up in a sheltered environment in mid-Missouri, attended church several times a week and made most of my friendships through the church. But I attended public school and, because of that experience, I think at age 16 I understood more of how the world worked than my students, whose social interactions invariably take place in a strictly Christian atmosphere.

When asked about this, Scott Williams, the Christian Fellowship principal, answered with a Christian school mainstay: the “hot house example.” Christian schools are like hot houses, the theory goes. Students are plants that, while in the protected environment of the schoolhouse, where the winds of the outside world are controlled, they grow strong. When the full force gale of the wider world hits them upon graduation, their deep Christian roots will hold them steady.

“We are working to prepare the students, not just protect them,” Williams said.

Yet, Williams knows that the winds of change are already blowing for his older students and that Christian Fellowship can only influence them for so long.

Clemons notes that some students and their parents start considering a switch to public schools by the time they reach his 11th and 12th grade-level class. Williams and Dan Peterson, Heritage Academy’s former chief administrator agreed, saying that 10th grade is a pivotal year for many students.

“I’ve found a pattern,” Peterson said. “A lot of our students come in the middle-school range, and once they get through that stage parents consider sending them back into public schools.”

While some parents consider the broader education afforded by public schools, many feel their children have been solidly grounded in the Christian faith and are ready to face the world at large.

My experience taught me that a constant evangelical Christian environment doesn’t always mean Christian school students fit a certain stereotype. Some try to impress their peers by being more like their public school friends. They listen to secular rock music, make references to R-rated movies, wear parodies of “South Park” T-shirts and discuss the parts of their weekends their parents don’t know about.

Others are like Rachel Duker, an 11th grader at Christian Fellowship School. Over lunch in the school’s cafeteria, Duker confessed that she spends most of her time within Christian Fellowship’s walls.

“I’m always here at church,” she said. “I spend less time at my house than this building.”

Across the table, Rachel’s classmate Danielle Cundiff recalled how she came to Christian Fellowship a year ago from Hallsville High School. It was part of her long-term plan, she said, which includes getting a bachelor’s degree from Northwest Missouri State and studying physical therapy at MU.

“I came here because I wanted to grow spiritually,” Cundiff said. “It will prepare me for college. The harder classes will prepare me, too.”

Recently, as the end of the school year approached, I asked my senior students at Heritage Academy if they felt prepared for the secular influences of college life and beyond.

Having just completed a master’s degree in journalism, I am preparing for the next stage of my own life. I will be moving to Wilmore, Ky., so my husband, Tom, can study theology at Asbury Seminary. Although I have had several job interviews, it’s looking as if I will have to take whatever freelance opportunities come my way, at least for a time.

My students’ feelings about their immediate futures were similar to the way I‘ve been thinking, namely a combination of confidence in the wisdom of my path and uncertainty about what I might encounter along the way.

Nate Schirmer, who plans to study engineering at Cedarville University in Ohio, anticipates a seamless move from high school to college. “Since I’m looking at a smaller Christian college anyway, it will probably be an easy transition from here,” he said.

But Tiffany Sutton answered with a definitive “No.”

“Because our school is small, there is not a diverse group here,” she said. “Most of us go to the same church or the same type of church. We remotely believe the same things.”

Mary Russell, an 11th grader, noted that the environment she had become used to “is a lot more conservative than out in the world, especially in college.”

Her classmate David Moser echoed the point, noting that they all would have to adapt to meet the challenges of “secular areas” of life.

However, for Sutton, who is headed to Columbia College to study business in the fall, the chance to experience a new environment is something she looks forward to.

“But there will be a lot more freedom,” she said. “Our parents won’t be there telling us what to believe.”