Is this fair?

Parent Cafe
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<p>I believe schools should be neutral about religion. Not anti-religion.</p>

<p>Tlaktan (Andrew): Nice to see you posting from England, where I hope you are enjoying living. I agree with almost everything you say. Except that you did not become a devout Presbyterian in a vacuum. You were taught, at home, and presumably at church. Whoever taught you in Sunday school was performing a community service. Just as my S did when he went door to door talking to people about the environment; or others urging people to vote.</p>

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<p>I also see this more like an internship for a company where the main beneficiary is the company than the more typical community service where you are helping other people or the environment. Basically you are educating children to be members of your congregation. At least that’s the way I see it.</p>

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<p>I agree, any sort of community service, in most part goes unrecognized, so I wouldn’t count on the school accepting that as “hours.” </p>

<p>I agree that it does not make sense as your community service should not be limited to a list of approved programs. Rather you should be entitled to submit hours based on service where you feel you can make the most difference. I don’t know what your schools views are in regards to this, but you should bring that up, as it would make for a very valid argument. I understand if the school only approves hour for projects that are beneficial to the school, as sometimes they may need all the help they can get. However, I still believe you have a valid argument, there is no reason why serving your community in various ways are considered to be sub-par, after all servicing the community is something an individual should do based on their ability to contribute to a certain cause, not to contribute to a cause where they will get the most recognition for.</p>

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<p>You shouldn’t get any benefit or credit for this type of indoctrination.</p>

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<p>^^Hi, gottaloveucla</p>

<p>It’s always good to welcome new members. So, welcome! My S attends school in California and it’s a big adjustment for me, but he’s very happy not to face snow next month as we do here.</p>

<p>On your posting: I find that when people agree with something imparted in class, it’s called “teaching” but if they disagree it’s “indoctrination.” </p>

<p>If parents want to send their own children to acquire values they hold dear, but aren’t individually equipped to teach, they might choose to send them to a religious school for organized lessons. </p>

<p>Children are too young to decide on this, but understand that when parents steer clear of such schools, they are also teaching another understanding of the world. I"ve heard it called secular, agnostic, atheistic, material, aesthetic, and I’m not judging or even successful in naming it. </p>

<p>I’m just saying that, in either case, parents choose for their children and lay down a point of view thereby.</p>

<p>Parents pass along values to their children, in a continuous stream of thousands of small choices, every week. </p>

<p>You don’t learn how to play a musical instrument without lessons, either, but we don’t refer to parents who send their kids to study clarinet as “indoctrinating” them with music. It’s just teaching them how to do something nice. By learning how to say a prayer or sing a song, kids might become comfortable, delighted, or appalled by their religion. When older, they’ll either continue, tweak, or detest it. </p>

<p>Parents who enjoy religious settings want their kids to know how to function when they walk inside a house of worship. Parents who love music similarly understand if you can play an instrument, you’ll enjoy concert halls more. Nobody “has” to go to either a church or a concert hall. </p>

<p>If you send a kid in for lessons, you hope the teaching is good. I’m guessing the OP was a good teacher, and in that way did her community a service by doing that job well for free. </p>

<p>Re: you post, why not call religious instruction just “teaching”? In other words, how do we get all the up the rhetoric ladder to “indoctrinating”? That’s the part I don’t get.</p>

<p>Anyways, welcome.</p>

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<p>p3t: While I agree with your point that whether a parent sends or does not send their children to religious school, they are teaching them something.</p>

<p>However, I don’t think the dichotomy here is between someone teaching their child that Christianity is the absolute right faith, and someone teaching their child that religion is stupid. The latter would obviously be just as indoctrinating as the former.</p>

<p>However, what if a parent simply teaches their children to always question things and think critically about everything, without teaching them a specific view on religion?</p>

<p>The above is my preferred approach (having shamelessly stolen it from Dawkins). There’s a very large difference between it and the two different kinds of indoctrination I mentioned before.</p>

<p>The problem, in my mind, with teaching a child religion at a young age is that rational thinking is anathema in religious discussion, generally. And I think that, no matter the topic, teaching children to parrot what they’re told to believe is never right.</p>

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<p>1of42, that all sounds good unless one is a committed Christian. Since I truly believe God exists, and that Jesus was His son, then I am not teaching “religion” to my children, rather I am teaching them the truth as I see it. And I am helping them form a personal relationship with God. I don’t see that as indoctrination. That’s just being a responsible parent. </p>

<p>I also believe it would be irresponsible for - as an example - a believing Jew not to teach their children the Jewish faith. If you are a Jew, why on earth would it be wrong to want to teach your children about God, in the language and teachings you believe in? This would be like not teaching your kids to be polite, or to help their elders. You can’t keep a child in a vacuum, devoid of moral teaching and social courtesies, and suddenly expect them at the age of 18 to simply figure everything out for themselves. If you don’t teach a kid to respect others when they’re young they won’t have the tools to figure it out when they’re older. </p>

<p>Being a Christian and being a rational skeptic are not mutually exclusive. I don’t see any dochotomy between believing in God and questioning your faith. In other words, if you believe but never question - including doubt which is the genesis of faith - then your faith probably won’t be well-founded enough stand up to challenge or test. </p>

<p>Having said that - back to the original question. Since all these issues everyone is bring up are good questions, why do the schools even have community service requirements at all? My kids went to public schools and I’m not aware of any service requirements for graduation. Why don’t the schools just teach, and leave the moral issues to the parents? In today’s climate for college admissions most kids are going to perform community service anyway, so why should the schools get involved in the muddled questions of what is community service and what isn’t?</p>

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<p>Simple, you claim that you should leave it to the parents, but once the school decides to no longer support community service, there goes the neighborhood. All the parents will be in a frenzy stating the school does not teach proper morale. Parents always complain regardless of the situation. The schools that require community service are usually the better private institutions who are doing this for the children’s benefit. By guaranteeing a certain number of community work, college admissions officers are more likely to look at the students as better well-rounded individuals who understand the importance of contributing to society.</p>

<p>Like it or not, plenty of parents are hell-bent on grades and performance in school that they are completely unaware of their children’s encumbrance to give back to society. Many other scenarios come to mind. The fact of the matter is, colleges like to see students who have been active members of their community as they will most likely end up contributing to society more so than selfish greedy folks. The elite schools are elite for a reason, requiring such programs leads on average to be excepted to better schools, which indirectly effects the type of parents attracted to the school, which directly effects the school’s endowment. There is economic reasoning behind all the programs administered by schools. I wouldn’t go so far to complain and say “well teach our kids morals, you teach them math.” I apologize for stating this, but that is an absolutely ridiculous way to raise children. School children spend long hours at school, and asking students to participate may get some students who had no prior to interest to begin playing an active role in philanthropy.</p>

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Isn’t evident that the schools require community service are on average elite private schools? Ever wonder why top-tier universities prefer students from these schools? The same material is taught more or less. It is based on the ethic of the school. </p>

<p>Do not take what I said wrong and imply I am indirectly calling you or anyone else a bad parent, or suggesting anyone has poor judgment. It is just fact that this is what separates the elite schools from public school.</p>

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<p>Florida Bright Futures 100% tuition/$300 per semester stipend requires at least 75 hours of community service. Therefore, many schools feel that encouraging students to perform the service is as important as encouraging them to do well academically. Both go hand in hand toward getting the students off to college.</p>

<p>Not all publics require CS for graduation, but I believe the schools of choice do. They also require the students to submit a proposal and pick an area they intend to target for their service (ex: health services, education, environmental, etc.). They don’t allow unrelated service hours to count toward the overall service requirement if they don’t fall within the scope of the proposal. Personally, I think that’s a little too rigid.</p>

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<p>Don’t you think all this politically correct nonsense is being taken a bit too far? </p>

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<p>Simple answer to this as well. Being a religious parents, you will be more inclined to teach your children that there is a lord, and he is watching our every move, and he will reward you for good. It is far superior to teach your child that his actions are judged by the lord, and that he will be rewarded for doing good. </p>

<p>Being apart of a religious community is a very rewarding experience. Raise your child with the religious belief you want to, they have brains if they feel the religion isn’t for them they will not follow when they come of age. It is far more feasible to teach our kids that there are consequences for their actions, than “believe what you want.”</p>

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<p>No it isn’t evident. Elite, ethic,…fact? You don’t want to go there.</p>

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<p>I can believe a public school would be hesitant to consider teaching religious courses a community service. They may be defining community service as volunteer work that helps the greater community. Feeding the homeless would fall into this definition. Setting up chairs for a talk at the local millionaires club on how to shelter their assets from taxes wouldn’t. (Even if the kids setting up chairs don’t get paid…) It could be argued that teaching Christians Christianity, though very advantageous for the Christians, couldn’t really be thought of as being advantageous to the community as a whole. Unless of course one would like to argue it is advantageous that the community have lots of Christians. And really, as a public school, would you want to even go near that kind of argument.</p>

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<p>UriA702 - all the public schools in this area require service learning hours, so it has nothing to do with elitism. The kids usually go way beyond that requirement.</p>

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<p>I just remembered reading about a proposed change in Japanese elementary school curriculum, where they;d devote a half day each week, starting at age 6, to bring the entire class to senior citizen homes and sing to them. I can’t recall if they already do that and it was just listed, or if it was a proposed change. (Anybody know??)</p>

<p>If we built this level of community service into our children at the youngest age, and teach them to leave the school walls to go and help other community instiutions, we’d not be fussing over 20-some hours of CS for high school students!</p>

<p>Anyway, the curriculu8m document I read expressed it as an understanding that teaching children to care for the elderly is part of being a responsible citizen of Japan. It had no religous words in it, obviously. </p>

<p>We’d NEVER free up an afternoon each week to do this. Way too busy celebrating Halloween and stuff in our public elementary schools to bother with all those old people. And the extra cost to run school buses through town at that hour? No way.</p>

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<p>the difference i see is that community being served in a church CLASSROOM is a very narrow and self selected group, it is not like you are helping those outside your realm</p>

<p>teaching religion to me is not CS- it is part of your religious practice, to be honest</p>

<p>if you were taking those same kids out to clean up a beach, or having those kids make sandwiches for the homeless, then I would argue the hours should count, but you are not</p>

<p>you are teaching them a religious text, doing religious songs, playing religious games, and it is a closed off group</p>

<p>I was a girl scout troop leader and my troop happened to meet in a church basement room- but the program was open to all girls- not jsut the Christian ones</p>

<p>CS shouldn’t only help those that have the same beliefs as you do…that is YOUR community only, not the “real” community as is implied by CS</p>

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<p>teaching religion to me is not CS- it is part of your religious practice, to be honest</p>

<p>clear way of putting it CGM</p>

<p>I also see this more like an internship for a company where the main beneficiary is the company than the more typical community service where you are helping other people or the environment. Basically you are educating children to be members of your congregation. At least that’s the way I see it.
Also a good point.</p>

<p>I realize widespread & expected community service is a " new" ( read in the last 20-30 years) thing in many communities.
It certainly was not part of my high school education, although different groups like Girl Scouts, participated in activities like raising money for Unicef or baking cookies for nursing home residents.
However- I have been involved in co-operatives for about 45 years, must be the Scandinavian influence. :wink: Volunteering in the schools for about 25 years.</p>

<p>Government funds public schools- **We are the government **. We believe education is important- so schools are something that are funded through federal, state & local budgets. ( I am not going to start a thread on adaquate funding) Even if I didn’t attend public schools, or have a child who does, I benefit from public schools by living in an educated community.</p>

<p>Full disclosure-I believe strongly in community service- I’ve posted several times about my kids volunteering well over and above their schools requirements, even before they were in high school. My oldest daughter spent a year in service through Americorps after high school and her sister plans on doing the same. I think every high school graduate should do the same- that for a successful society , we need to give back and acknowledge our responsibility to the whole.</p>

<p>Some families may also value community service and make a point to teach that value to their children. That’s great. But as a society if we have giving back as a value- we don’t leave it up to the vagaries of parental motivation to assume that all families will instill that ethic. ( which is also why I believe accurate & appropriate health information including sexual education should also be part of public school curriculum)</p>

<p>All schools require a great deal of community service from adults. From PTAs working to get levies on the ballot, booster clubs holding spaghetti feeds for money for uniforms & even just driving on field trips. We see disproportionality in schools when they don’t have a strong group of parents who have the time and money to work in & for the schools.</p>

<p>By requiring community service- we are stating that it is important enough that everyone needs to participate.</p>

<p>Also- while HGFM stated they don’t attend the Lakewood Long Beach high school where I found this list- these are activities through the student’s church that * are* counted for community service.

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<p>To be more accurate I should have said * Successful schools expect and receive a great deal of support from their communities*
I realize that our area (public} schools don’t require hours from parents- but it makes a world of difference when it is a stated value and when it is given weight not only by the school but by parents and students as well.</p>

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<p>I have over 200 hours as a volunteer at a homeless shelter that is faith based and kept running by a series of churches. Our shelter guests are not required to claim christianity or participate in any religious services. Would my work also be void?</p>

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<p>not in the way I read the description from the Long Beach area high school
see#76</p>

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<p>If you are serving food, checking the homeless in, cleaning, etc. I do not think anyone should have a problem with it - it is community service. If you are teaching a Bible class at the shelter, it is a different issue, and most likely it will not be counted towards your school’s CS requirement.</p>