America’s Faulty Educational Equation

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Educational expenses have exploded in the United States since the middle of the twentieth century, and there has been a tragic educational shift from the value of the Christian worldview or the cross to that of the dollar sign in American education. It could be they effect each other. In 1950 the average expense in public schooling per student was $1,437 where at the turn of the century it was $6,624 per year and now is $12,608 per student a year, and we without question see the unraveling of school discipline and achievement since prayer and bible reading were removed back in early 1960s.

Expenses have escalated, while academic achievement has abated in educational domains of primary and secondary schooling…

In respect to America’s comparison with other industrial powers the United States spends an average of over $91,700 per student between the ages of six and fifteen, which is more spending on education than any other country except Switzerland, a nation greatly influenced by the Reformed understanding, and additionally caught up in progressive, expensive thinking.

It is interesting that the United States spends a third more than Finland, a country under great Christian influence from its foundation, which consistently ranks near the top in science, reading, and math testing, while the United States is way down the list in academic achievement in comparison with the other industrialized nations. (“K-12 Spending Per Student in the OECD”—Veronique de Ruby, Mercatus Center at George Mason University).

In an article, “American high school students slip in global education rankings,” by Greg Palkot,  (FoxNews.com, December 3, 2013) it brought out that:“The influential Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has just released its much-awaited triennial study of global education systems, and once again, the U.S. earns bad grades. According to the study, American fifteen-year-olds tested were average in reading and science skills, and below-average in math over-all.  According to the U.S. Department of Education, American students’ rankings in math have slipped from 24th to 29th compared to the last test in 2010. In science, they’ve gone from 19th to 22nd, and from 10th to 20th in reading.

Spending money on education does not necessarily equal educational achievement. And subtracting Christian values does not cultivate a positive morality in the students, since it often attacks the true development of individual responsibility. Trusting in the dollar to bring success and the astronomical debt that is increasingly exploding with student loans and our national debt–much of it used to provide educational loans to individuals.  We are subtracting the influence of the cross from public schools, and substituting the dollar as the vital element in education.

In the attempt to avoid Americanization in education we have assumed a philosophy that one size fits all, as it has set up what can be called an industrialized system of education where the concern is to cultivate the development of the group mentality of multiculturalism and political correctness, while avoiding any ultimate commitment. It is to be submissive to the so-called academic elite that seeks to subtract any taint of Christian values and to alter the Judeo-Christian culture from which our nation evolved and which is basic to the establishment of our land. The equation does not work.

The tide turned in American education during the second half of the 20^th century with the Supreme Court decisions of 1962 and 1963, when prayer and Bible reading were removed from the public schools.  There has been an overall academic progressive decline in morals, an increasing lack of intellectual vigor, a growing purposelessness, and a great insensitivity of any sense of duty to God, others, or even the students themselves. American Protestantism, greatly influenced by Reformed thinking from the nineteenth century was replaced with the secular humanism of the twentieth, while contradicting our educational foundation from the Reformation.  It is not working, and does not achieve what it promises in the overall picture. It seems we might be “ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth,” (II Timothy 3:7) as the Bible says.

Over the past fifty or so years we can observe that the United States federal government has increasingly become more and more involved with education to the point of running it, while it constantly seeks to subtract religious influence, especially Christian influence. It has been observed that: “The visible attacks on Christianity include: banning of prayer; censorship of Christmas themes; use of textbooks that hide religion’s role in the country’s history; outright impugning of the religion; and, increasing attempts to promote the study of Islamic history into American classrooms while ignoring other religions.” (“Public Schools vs. Christianity,” by Bruce Deitrick Price- January 26, 2014)

Price also observed that there are other kinds of attack besides these outward visible ones on Christianity. He says, “These attacks are psychological or spiritual in nature, nearly invisible, and rarely reported.” He brings out that, “Some critics have long charged that the Education Establishment wants to dumb down the country. Hearing this, we think of minds being numbed.”  It seems very much evident that some educational methods are more concerned, we might say, with numbing souls.

The shift from the educational support from the Judeo-Christian foundation turned the tide the particularly in the second half of the 20^th century in America, since the Supreme Court decisions of 1962 and 1963 when prayer and Bible reading were removed from the public schools.  It is without question there has an overall academic decline and a real decline in morals, along with an increasing lack of intellectual vigor, a growing purposelessness, and a great insensitivity any sense of duty to God, others, or even themselves in he students. American Protestantism in conjunction with Roman Catholic schooling of the nineteenth century is being replaced with the secular humanism of the twentieth, and who knows what will be in the 21st.

Robin S. Eubanks in the book, Credentialed to Destroy, talks about classroom techniques that render students confused and defeated. It is brought out that instead of gaining confidence in their ability to function effectively, that the children learn they are incapable or the right world views in themselves. The goal seems to be to break down each child’s spirit, in the hope of creating a group mentality.

A study by the National Parent-Teachers Organization revealed that in the average American school, eighteen negatives are identified for every positive one that is pointed out. The Wisconsin study revealed that when children enter the first grade, 80 percent of them feel good about themselves, but by the sixth grade, only 10 percent of them have good self-images. (Speaker’s Sourcebook, Glenn Van Ekeren, p. 119).

Eubanks observes that: “At the end of this process, where is the individual human and that individual’s relationship with God? This child’s only relationship is with a group. Otherwise the child is conformist and stunted. Abstract thinking is reduced. Horizons of every kind are limited, by design.”  It is a sad picture, but it part of the process developing as our educational system increasingly as it subtracts the influence of the cross and expands the borrowed almighty dollar…

The Bible well says in I Timothy 6:10 that, “The Love of Money is The Root of All Evil”.  The love of money is founded on an illusion.  Money is not evil in itself, but the love of it can be most destructive in that the thirst for it can be insatiable and create the great illusion that it can provide lasting security and happiness.

One of the chief motivations in getting an education in our society it to make money for better the better educated generally make more money.  But this often neglects the greatest of motivation which the life in Christ can provide, “to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.”  By placing money as so central to education our society is worshipping the dollar sign above the cross.  The cross calls for the responsible use of money, where to irresponsibly use it is a definite vice. William Barclay in his commentary on I Timothy 6:9-10 brings out how money’s right use is a “Christian duty.”

The Apostle Paul wrote in Galatians 5:11 about the “offense of the cross,” and Peter in I Peter 2:8 spoke of the Christian faith as a “rock of offense.” I Corinthians 1:18 says:  “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.” There is the offense of the cross of Christ, and although faith in the work of the cross is not to be imposed by the state in America, it is not to be attacked as guaranteed by the First Amendment.  We are observing a legal nightmare as public schools seek to impose a secular morality that sets up all kinds of stupid regulations in our public schools. The schools ignore the self-discipline innate in Christian commitment and seek to find conformity without true community and the quest for truth.

There is the great astronomically increasing debt of our nation. The explosive expense of the great increase in legal and illegal students together with the language problems only magnifies it. Yes Uncle Sam has a major problem in respect to education, and without question he needs a lesson in mathematics as he seeks to solve the education equation.  They have left God out, and the educational achievement they wish does not come.

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by Joe Renfro, Ed.D., Educational Columnist, Radio Evangelist, Retired Teacher and Pastor, 5931 West Avenue, Lavonia, Georgia 30553,  706-356-4173, joerenfro@windstream.net

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