We just returned from Lookout Mountain, TN. This weekend was pre-orientation at Covenant College. It was an opportunity for incoming college freshmen to beat the opening day rush at college and get some things done early (get the Scots card, register for classes, meet the roommate, meet the adviser, get registered for work study etc etc).
For parents it was an opportunity to gain perspective on this thing called the college years.
College has frankly been a shock to my system.
The cost of college is beyond staggering when you have four kids bound for private Christian education at institutions with small endowments and few scholarships. Paying for college looks close to impossible. In my darker moments, I have questioned all of my convictions and wondered what in the world I am embarking on.
So how does one keep from freaking out?
Various people have tried to encourage me. I have heard things like "focus on one semester at a time." "Don't do the math (four kids x four years)." "We could not afford it either, but God provided." "You get more help when your second kid is enrolled."
None of these things have helped. Here is what has helped me keep my sanity.
When I remain focused on the purpose of college and keep my eyes fixed on the overall goal, then the joy is not sucked out of life. In fact, I can actually enjoy this experience ... even as I sign on for ten year Parent plus loans!
So what is the purpose?
College is about equipping minds and shaping souls to grow in wisdom. These years are about transitions. My kid is transitioning to adulthood. I am transitioning from parenting a high schooler to parenting an adult. I am entrusting others to come alongside my wife and I to mentor my kids in how to discern truth from falsehood and walk in the way of wisdom. College is about learning how to look at and understand reality. Are job skills a part of that reality? Yes, but they are only a part. Job skills are part of learning about your calling and responding to that calling. While that is no doubt important, I am far more interested in the development of their souls during these transition years.
Are there cheaper options out there?
Absolutely. State schools in Virginia are far cheaper than private college in Georgia at a school with little endowment and few scholarships. I get that. If job skills were the whole purpose of college, I would happily send my kid to some cheap state school to get a degree.
However, I don't want to entrust the shaping of the souls of my kids to someone who holds a false view of reality no matter how cheap it is. The thought of paying someone to teach my kid a false way of thinking is completely ludicrous. I could not do it.
Will my convictions mean that I could possibly be paying off school loans until I am 76? Yes, it could.
And it is worth every penny.
That's a depressing post, Mr D. Unsurprisingly my kids will go to 'regular' university, unless they choose otherwise. I'm sure they will be exposed to many ideas there that I would disagree with, but I had hoped that a) I would view that as part of the point, and b) they would have a sufficient moral/ethical/whatever compass in place by then that they would handle such things, however imperfectly.
This is a decade away for me, but it's disheartening to hear that such fragility is a real possibility for kids such as yours who I'm sure have been brought up well (if a little misguidedly!)
Posted by: Paul | June 21, 2010 at 09:52
Paul,
Let's try a thought experiment.
Fast forward a decade.
Your child comes to you and said, Dad, would you please pay for me to go to Liberty University (the college that Reverend Jerry Falwell founded http://www.liberty.edu/).
It would only cost you $150,000 of your savings dad. I think it is the place I need to be. I want to learn from the faculty that Reverend Falwell hired and I know I could get a great job coming out of this excellent institution.
I am not going to bother to ask how you would feel about the wisdom of that decision. I already know.
Posted by: Mr. D | June 21, 2010 at 10:27
You're absolutely right, but for the wrong reason. My understanding is that Liberty is a bad university. If my child wanted to go to, say Wheaton College in Illinois, which is a Christian university that is academically very good, I'd have no problem with it.
I'm already, in a small way, working to back that up. My daughter is a little variable on the subject, but I think at the moment she believes in a god. She understands that her parents don't, that my mother did, and that my father *really* doesn't. She will continue to make her own choice in that area, just as I did (my mother was far more influential on my life than my father, yet my religious views are much closer to his), and I'll continue to support her. I hope that in time my support will come not from a general philosophy, but because I trust her to make her own decisions.
*Note: I'd have a problem paying $150,000 for any education, because it's not a justifiable number, but that's a side issue.
Posted by: Paul | June 23, 2010 at 08:58
Liberty is a fine university, so I think you've been given bad information. But I agree with you that Wheaton College is a strong university and your daughter would be taught from a Christian worldview in all of her classes. I hope she ends up at Wheaton. That would be a good thing.
So what if your daughter embraced intelligent design and wanted to work for Discovery Institute so she could promote the teaching of intelligent design in public schools.
Would you continue to support her decision?
Re: $150,000 for four years of college
I don't know if you have checked college tuition recently, but 35 to 40 thousand a year at less than ivy league schools is becoming common place. In ten years, I would expect a college education to be past $200,000 for four years at a "second rate" college.
Posted by: Mr. D | June 23, 2010 at 09:50
Liberty University is ranked in the lowest tier by US News and World Report. Wheaton College is ranked in the top tier. Another highly ranked conservative Christian school is Hope College in Holland, Michigan. I would not have objected to my children choosing Wheaton or Hope, but I would not have paid for them to go to Liberty. As it turned out, my daughter went to Knox College, which is a small school of the same caliber as Hope and Wheaton. My son went to University of Wisconsin.
If either of my children decided to work for the Discovery Institute, I would think them to be incredibly silly but I certainly would not try to interfere with their decision.
Posted by: Vinny | June 23, 2010 at 22:34
Vinny and Paul,
What do you think the purpose of college is?
Also, what is the purpose of parenting (specifically as it pertains to a parenting an 18 year old high school graduate)?
The answers to those questions ought to shape this whole discussion ... much more so than U.S. News and World Report rankings.
Posted by: Mr. D | June 24, 2010 at 09:54
Going in to debt to pay for any education, no matter how good, is a bad idea. "the borrower is slave to the lender". The kids need to pick a school they can afford, work part (or full) time to help pay for it, and pick a major that will, along with personal growth, allow them to be financially independent THE DAY they step out of college. IF they can't do all these things, college is not the answer for them.
Posted by: ZZ | June 24, 2010 at 19:56
ZZ,
What, in your opinion, is the purpose of college?
Posted by: Mr. D | June 24, 2010 at 21:28
It can have several. The first is to enable it's graduates to contribute the maximum they can to society and to earn a good living while doing it (which ALSO contributes to society by deepening the tax base). A secondary purpose is self enrichment. Neither purpose is high enough to justify going into debt, but the latter especially so.
Posted by: ZZ | June 27, 2010 at 20:26
Based on the experiences of my wife and myself in university, we'll be encouraging the kids to go to a state university and to get involved in a local church and one of the parachurch ministries like Intervarsity.
I see no point in going into debt for the undergraduate portion of an education, especially if they intend to pursue postgraduate studies. Even if they have the grades, I'll actively discourage them from applying to the ivy leagues as undergraduates. If they want to go to Harvard or Duke, wait for graduate school when the university might pay them, rather than vice versa.
FWIW, my sister went to Liberty. Judging by her experience, I won't be pleased if either of the kids insists on going there. I would be quite happy if they want to go to Messiah or one of the mennonite colleges. I'm impressed by friends who went to those schools.
Posted by: Nickp | June 29, 2010 at 08:43
Nick,
Parachurch groups are great, but they don't change the fact that you are still writing checks and supporting those who are teaching your 18 year old what is true about humanity, ethics, psychology, economics, justice, success, relationships (you name it) from presuppositions about the world that are antithetical to Biblical truth.
As a parent, I can't find a way to reconcile that with the Biblical responsibility of a parent to raise my son or daughter in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.
I don't think an 18 year old gets it. They are still transitioning to adulthood.
Incidentally, I don't hold the view that Christians who send their kids to state schools are sinning. This is not an area to bind consciences, in my view. I think we are called to act with wisdom and faith.
I would like to learn about your sister's experience at Liberty. What went wrong?
Posted by: Mr. D | June 29, 2010 at 09:51
Mr. D.,
> Incidentally, I don't hold the view
> that Christians who send their kids
> to state schools are sinning. This is
> not an area to bind consciences, in
> my view. I think we are called to act
> with wisdom and faith.
Agreed, especially on that last sentence. And I don't think parents who shell out for an expensive private school are necessarily acting foolishly. A private Christian school or a public university can be a wise or a foolish decision depending on the child.
I guess we're all shaped by our experiences. I found my classes and the diversity of viewpoints at a public university to be challenging and exhilarating, and not just in class. My room-mate and best friend for all four years was an atheist, which made for interesting dorm room discussions. Of course, I was majoring in one of the natural sciences and minoring in history, mostly ancient and medieval Europe. Perhaps my experience would have been different in philosophy or one of the more loosey-goosey and political liberal arts.
The other side of public university was that no one pressured me to attend a church or join Intervarsity. I had to do that myself, and it was an important part of making Christianity my own faith, not just that of my parents or other authority figures. I wonder if that would have happened at a Christian school, or if I would just have been going through the motions.
Anyway, since I had an overwhelmingly positive experience at a public university with all its opportunities for research and scholarship, I'd love if my kids had a similar experience.
Posted by: Nickp | June 29, 2010 at 10:55
Mr. D.
If you don't mind telling, did you go to a christian or a secular college? If the latter, were you a Christian or not at the time?
Posted by: Nickp | June 29, 2010 at 11:11
I went to both.
I headed off to a secular college as a nominal Christian. My main reason for believing Christianity was true was because my parents believed it was true. I was an information systems major. I took some humanities and science in addition to programming classes. I knew people had different beliefs, but I was not familiar with the idea of people holding core assumptions about reality and how their ideas all flowed from their assumptions. Under their teaching, I gradually began to adopt an atheistic worldview. Naturalism seemed plausible and religion seemed primitive. I began to think ideas such as abortion were actually good for the planet since we were running out of resources on the earth. If there were Christian groups on campus, I never found them. I frankly was not the least interested.
To keep the story short, let's just say that God met me in the middle of all that and changed my perspective.
I transferred to a private Christian college because I knew I need to be mentored by Christians who knew more than I did. I benefited greatly from being taught from a perspective of truth, rather than having to try to figure out what part of the professor's lecture was based on his false assumptions of the world and the way it works. I learned ethics, economics, computer science, business, sociology ... you name it ... from a Biblical perspective. I learned how to think Christianly about all of life, not just about church or my personal walk with Christ. I too ended up owning my faith and knowing why it is true ... other than just that my parents believed it.
I realize we all have different experiences. Part of wisdom is reflecting on those experiences and learning from them. But part of wisdom is also looking at the purpose of college ... and then acting wisely and in accordance with that purpose.
If the purpose of college is to get a job, as many believe, then it is understandable why so many Christians go the secular route. It is more affordable and probably opens more doors for a job. As I stated in my post, however, I don't believe that is the primary purpose for education including college.
Thanks for asking about my experience. That was a fair and good question.
Posted by: Mr. D | July 01, 2010 at 07:35
Sorry, Mr. D, I plain forgot about this thread!
First, as Vinny points out, Liberty isn't a good university academically, but it appears we can both agree on Wheaton.
Second, yes, I would continue to support her if she wanted to join the DI, though at that point I don't think she'd be dependent on my support anyway; as far as I know there are no academically strong universities that teach what the DI espouses, so I would assume she'd left education by then.
Finally, I'd say the purpose of education is to learn skills for later life, to create a safe space in which to grow more mature (yes, I'm aware that's a pretty broad word), and to get a piece of paper to help employment prospects. That's what my university education bought me. Interestingly I don't recognise the experience you had with clashing world views; I had one lecturer who I guess was left-wing, and another who may have been leftist but was more likely just weird. Apart from that the only 'indoctrination' going on was from campus groups, who were sufficiently marginal that only the already marginal joined in with them. I don't know if this reflects the difference between US and UK universities, or just between you and me!
Posted by: Paul | August 04, 2010 at 02:24