The Desert Review | By Covenent Journey Academy Nov 5, 2024
A recent study published by UCLA’s Institute for Democracy, Education, and Access makes the startling claim that public school districts across the nation spent $3.2 billion in a single year fighting against concerned parents, conservative citizens, and the school board members they elected.
The report relies on survey results from 467 public school superintendents and select interviews with a smaller group of 42 hand-picked superintendents to paint a disturbing picture of parents and families who are concerned about their children’s education and choosing to speak up about it. It claims so-called “extremists,” referring to these concerned parents and their supporters, pose a threat to schools — even a physical danger to school board meetings — while forcing schools to waste financial resources defending against unfounded complaints and “disinformation” about things like mask mandates, sexualized library books, LGBTQ and Critical Race Theory (CRT) school lessons, activities, and courses, and more.
At various times in the 16-page document, conservative parents, concerned community members, and elected school board members who support parental rights are pejoratively labeled as “extremists,” “parent activists,” “conflict entrepreneurs,” and “agents of disruption.” The report dismisses their concerns as false propaganda, fear mongering, and misinformation and complains dramatically that concerned parents and their supporters have inconvenienced the public school system by participating in protected activities such as:
Expressing their concerns at school board meetings and causing meetings to run long
Expressing their opinions on social media
Reading shocking passages from public school library books at school board meetings
Requesting public records
Supporting the passage of parental rights legislation
Questioning or criticizing state approved curricula, and
Questioning or criticizing the ideas public schools are teaching and promoting to children in areas such as Critical Race Theory (CRT) and matters of morality and human sexuality including “gender transition,” gender dysphoria, and other LGBT+ related issues
The study, authored by academics from four liberal universities, uses uncited quotations from anonymous public school superintendents to villainize parents and parental rights supporters and to promote a disconcerting conclusion: that public schools are “caught in the crosshairs of a societal war.”
The study’s aggressive and adversarial treatment of parents exposes the deep dysfunction plaguing public schools in America and stands in stark contrast to Covenant Journey Academy’s philosophy of education.
“When the public school system starts treating parents as the enemy in a 3.2 billion-dollar, tax-payer-funded ‘war,’ the system is broken,” said Shawn Akers, CJA’s President and CEO. “Parents are not the enemy, and schools should not be warzones – societal or otherwise. This insistence on hijacking children’s education to push radical agendas and then demonizing parents, conservatives, and traditional values is exactly why homeschooling is the fastest growing segment of U.S. education.
CJA is giving parents a better option; we have a passion for partnering with parents to provide the safe, transparent, Christ-centered learning environment their children need to thrive. And whether they’ve homeschooled before or they’re just getting started, it’s never been easier to get your kids out of the chaos.”
Christian parents are more concerned than ever about America’s public education crisis, and this study unintentionally underscores the validity of their fears. As parents grow increasingly alarmed that their children are being indoctrinated with a secularized, politically correct, anti-God worldview, this study effectively equates discernment and wisdom with disruption and division merely for the sake of disruption and division.
But the fact is, last year record numbers of parents shared their stories and expressed their apprehensions about the serious and growing problems in the public school system, including failing academics, bullying, hypersexualized and inappropriate library materials, radical “woke” ideologies being forced on their kids, and schools acting against parents’ wishes — even hiding information about children from their parents, including information related to “gender transitions” and gender dysphoria.
While the UCLA report dismisses parents’ concerns as meritless, courts and legislatures have not. Recently, a group of Pennsylvania mothers was successful in court after their school district violated their constitutional rights by teaching first grade students about gender transition and dysphoria — the judge ruling that the school was intolerant and disrespectful of the families’ moral beliefs. Similarly, over 30 state legislatures and the United States Congress have responded to parents’ growing concerns by proposing or passing parental rights legislation.
The most effective response, however, is coming directly from the growing number of parents who are removing their children from dysfunctional public schools and reclaiming their lives through homeschooling each year. With Covenant Journey Academy, parents no longer have to settle for a broken system; now they have a much better option. With CJA:
Certified teachers conduct high-quality courses from a biblical worldview.
Homeschooling provides a safe learning environment, and
Parents are involved every step of the way — knowing exactly what their children are being taught at every level.
“Covenant Journey Academy is fighting for families while others are fighting against them,” said Mat Staver, CJA’s Founder and Chancellor. “The only way to keep children from becoming casualties of this well-funded war against families is to get them out of the government-run schools. This is why we built Covenant Journey Academy – to provide parents with a school that’s on their side. We’re solving the education crisis one child at a time.”
Covenant Journey Academy is a full-service K-12 online Christian academy that is available to families and private schools around the world 24/7/365. A viable and affordable answer to America’s education crisis, CJA offers Christ-centered, high-quality, safe, flexible, accessible schooling to families who desire a superior learning experience built upon the foundation of a biblical worldview.