When Trevor was four years old, we were confronted with two decisions that totally blindsided us. Do we hold him back a year because of the school age-cutoff? And do we home school, go the private school route or enroll in the public school system? We never guessed that we would be facing such huge decisions in the early life of our first child. Decisions that would set the course for his entire academic career! We had barely finished potty training for cryin’ out loud!

Fortunately, for our first decision, Rich’s Aunt Susie was an invaluable resource. Aunt Susie had been an elementary school teacher for over twenty years and had wonderful perspective about the educational development and maturity of young boys and girls. We knew from various things we read and saw, that girls tend to mature earlier. But we didn’t have girl. We had a four year old boy that was “gifted and talented” and brilliant beyond his years as most proud parents believe (more on this next week).

Aunt Susie had two pieces of wisdom that helped us. The first was, based upon her years of experience, it’s better to have your child be the oldest student in the class due to the age cutoff. The older students in her class tended to understand and perform better with their school work. Meanwhile, the really young students had more of a tendency to struggle to keep up. That’s not to say that there weren’t exceptions, but that was the general trend.

Aunt Susie’s second piece of wisdom, was one thing that totally stunned us and solidified our decision to have Trevor start kindergarten as a soon to be six year old. She posed this question, ”When Trevor reaches High School, do you want him to be the first person in his class to drive or the last?” All of a sudden, flash backs from when we turned sixteen and our, not so great, driving experiences hit us head on! We definitely wanted him to be among the first of his friends to drive. Yet it was still crazy to consider all of that when you are looking at your precious little four year old!

Our next huge decision was to decide between sending Trevor to private school or public school. Home school was really not an option for us since we were both in the thick of our careers and didn’t feel like we could do a better job than the “professional” educators. We have many friends that home schooled their children. For many of them, their children thrived and it was a tremendous blessing to share that precious time with them. But we also know, some families where home schooling didn’t work out the way they had hoped.

Whether its home school, private school or public school, deciding which path to take really comes down to two considerations: Pros/Cons and Parental involvement. For us and the future of our four year old Trevor, we literally made a Pro/Con list and it looked something like this:

Private Christian School
Pros
• Christian environment (this was extremely important to us)
• Christian teachers
• Good academic reputation
Cons
• Cost – About $9000/yr at the time or $63,000 total k-6
• Limited financial resources compared to a public school district for educational programs
• Driving to drop off & pick up everyday

Public School
Pros
• Free (via our tax dollars)
• Nationally ranked School District
• Walk to and from School each day
Cons
• Definitely NOT a Christian environment
• Larger class sizes
• Uncertainty of teacher/curriculum perspective.

Of course our pro/con list was much more extensive than shown here, but you can get the general idea behind our thinking. Ultimately, we decided to go with pubic school because we thought it would be the better fit for Trevor and our family. We felt the public school option offered more educational opportunities for him than the private school could provide. And saving the money was a factor, as it would affect the family lifestyle we had envisioned.

Yet, even with that decision, we were extremely concerned about “exposing” our precious little Trevor to the evils of the secular world and liberal biased curriculum. What finally eased our concerns and fears was the second main consideration you need to evaluate – Parental Involvement. Even before we took any parenting classes, we knew that we needed to be engaged and intentional with Trevor’s education. This would allow us to minimize and mitigate any of the “cons” we had on our Public School list. We BOTH attended every back to school night, parent/teacher conference, and helped him understand his school work (again, more on this next week). This demonstrated to Trevor, not only our love for him, but how important education was in the Howard family. Additionally, we got to know Trevor’s teachers and partner with them with his learning.

Regarding the missing Christian element to public education, we drew upon Matthew 5:14-16. We decided that together, we and Trevor, would represent the light at our school, with his teachers, classmates and their families. Our thinking was that he would, eventually, be in the real world and face many challenges to the moral standard we taught him. And for us, we looked at public school as opportunity to teach into those moments that challenged the moral standard we instructed at home; knowing that it would serve Trevor by providing tangible examples to help him face those same types of challenges as a young adult.

For those of you with young children, we hope this helps you in your thinking about your child’s future educational path. For those of you with children already on the path, we hope this may provide you with some encouragement to either evaluate your current situation and make changes or confirm your what you are already doing.

Every child is different and every family situation is different. So what will work best for your child or children will vary. Home school might be the best answer or, maybe, private school. Some public schools are excellent and others are appalling. We have some friends who started out home schooling and then switched to public school from 5th grade on and that worked out great for them. Others started out with public and switched to private or home school. For the Howard boys, Public School has been a blessing academically and it allowed us countless opportunities to be the light!

Blessings to your family,
Shelly and Rich

In addition to OneFamily, we have two additional resources we would like to recommend as you navigate the academic years K -12:

Moms in Prayer – http://momsinprayer.org/ – A wonderful organization that connects Moms to meet and pray for their child, their teachers and their schools.

CFH (Christian Family Heritage) – http://christianfamilyheritage.org/ Both Shelly & Lis are Contact Moms for CFH. Stay tuned for our GEMS (Godly Encouragement for Moms) meetings starting up in September!