School choice: A new route for families ready to change direction

Two decades ago, my husband and I got married and started saving money to buy a home. When we bought that home and started having kids, we sent them to the nearby public school. Our kids loved their elementary school, and so did we. Things were great until they weren’t, around when they reached junior high.

There was no helpful transition from elementary to junior high. Almost immediately, the books they were assigned to read were about death and destruction, suicide, and sex. They saw graphic videos: for instance, one had a child who had been cyber-bullied and committed suicide. Not so much as a note came home warning parents of what their children would be exposed to that day, and therefore no option to preview or remove their children during said content. At back-to-school night, one look at the decorations in the classrooms was enough to see that teachers were using their classrooms and authority to push political agendas.

We began looking into other options for our children's’ education. Then the pandemic hit, and we had a choice of hybrid school — 2.5 days per week — or online education. Little did we know what long-term implications hybrid school would have on our children. There would be no effort to help them stay on track the remaining 2.5 days, or remediation once in-person school returned. Classes like math and foreign language, which require a solid base on which to build day after day, have become the biggest challenge. Our child who always loved school the most, has become one who is reluctant to even go to school anymore.

If only we had more quickly made the decision — and if only we had had the money — to withdraw our kids from a district which offered us only two poor options.

Public schools today are creating generations of people who are not and will not be capable of distinguishing between truth and feelings. Students are taught that feelings determine reality, however, feelings very often do not inform us of reality. Students are being taught that their own feelings determine how others must treat them, that science can be summoned when it suits their purposes and can be ignored or manipulated when it contradicts them, and that definitions can be changed whenever convenient for the latest narrative.

Public schools have become churches of public opinion, in which students and teachers must profess belief in whatever politically-correct indoctrination the district momentarily approves, whether or not parents are informed of such teachings. Educators and school boards should make an effort to find out why people are removing their kids from public school, and should change the policies that have driven away families who value truth, common sense, respect, and personal responsibility.

Truth and facts have taken a back seat in public education. Opinions and political correctness are driving the bus now. Throwing money at the bus will not determine a new route, maybe Education Savings Accounts and school choice will. Thankfully, my family has decided to walk.

DeAnn Strayer is a parent from Iowa City.