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Charter's sponsor, Hillsdale College, has a slanted and extreme political point of view

9/19/2014

 
The following letter was written by Bloomington resident Janet Stake.

To the members of the Charter School Board:

I am writing to let you know my thoughts regarding the new proposed charter called Seven Oaks Classical School in Bloomington, Indiana. I have many concerns--including the fact that five of the seven board members are personal friends--- but my main concern is that this school is being guided by Hillsdale College through their Barney Charter School Initiative.  Hillsdale College is an extremely conservative college that attracts religious fundamentalists and classic libertarians. Since Hillsdale College is a private school, and they are all adults, I acknowledge their right to believe what they want to believe, and to teach what they want to teach.  

But I do have a problem with their single-mindedness when Hillsdale College wants to extend their slanted and extreme political point of view to K-12 education with public monies. Although couched in seemingly innocuous terminology such as moral character, civic virtue, and classical liberal arts, make no mistake, when you dig deeper you can clearly see that there is a political agenda.

For example, you can see evidence of this agenda on the Seven Oaks Classical School's website, under the heading of "Classical Education Resources".  A predominant number of books, articles, and videos come from Hillsdale faculty and other like-minded people. For example, the video entitled "Undoing of Dewey" by Terrence Moore from Hillsdale College, is an hour-long seminar for teachers that basically bashes traditional public schools for not really teaching anyone anything worthwhile. Dr. Moore uses a litany of anecdotes to misrepresent John Dewey's philosophy and to illustrate how bad the public schools are, as a result of following the philosophy of John Dewey.  

Another example of the radical mission of the Hillsdale College's foray into promoting charters is openly stated in the second paragraph of the Barney Charter School Initiative's educational philosophy statement:

"This mission has led us to consider how we can lead in the effort to recover our public schools from the tide of a hundred years of progressivism that has corrupted our nation’s original faithfulness to the previous 24 centuries of teaching the young the liberal arts in the West. The public school is arguably among the most important battlegrounds in our war to reclaim our country from forces that have drawn so many away from first principles. Almost 90 percent of our nation’s youth attend public schools, and there is no question that public education across America is in trouble."  

Please also note that the Seven Oaks School, noted on their application, would most likely hire their headmaster from Hillsdale College.

This is a political movement, even a "war", as openly stated on their website. I do not want anyone, from the right or the left, to be able to politicize our children's education.  I especially do not want the most extreme groups, such as those at Hillsdale College, to be able to indoctrinate our children with their views.  These are not mainstream views. These are people who believe that Barack Obama is not a legitimate president.  These are people who believe that President Obama is a Kenyan Socialist.  The right wing bloggers and the right wing media, such as Rush Limbaugh, laud Hillsdale College for its extreme political positions.

I want our children in Monroe County to be educated, not indoctrinated. I would greatly prefer that my tax dollars stay in MCCSC and RBB public schools where children are encouraged to become independent thinkers through critically analyzing, questioning, and evaluating all sides of issues.  

Please do not approve the charter for Seven Oaks.

Respectfully Submitted,

Janet Stake
Julie
1/30/2016 11:01:14 am

I understand your concerns. I recommend visiting one of the existing Barney charter schools and see for yourself what an excellent education it is. Our kids are currently enrolled at one of the Barney charter schools in Golden, Colorado. We are VERY pleased with the education they are receiving, and there has been absolutely no political or religious slant in any of their studies.

Florida Mom
10/24/2016 06:14:45 pm

You can't get more political than commom core and THAT is why I am grateful that there's another choice. Your insults and criticisms are the same things that parents are saying about common core in the public schools, where there's even a muslim content being taught. The classical education has been used over and over, while the new methods of common core (fuzzy math) have caused more problems for not only the teacher and students, but also the parents with homework that is no longer done the way we were taught. Our Hillsdale charter sent several teachers because they want them trained properly and are very picky about hiring the most educated and well trained teachers. As far as religion, I have yet to see anything that resembles what this misinformed parent presumes. She has received incorrect information and looks foolish to the parents who actually have children at these schools. Even homeschoolers who have never attended public school have enrolled because much of the curriculum is what the parents are already using. This person needs to educate herself on the FACTS.

Joseph
9/22/2017 06:53:00 am

Florida Mom I think that you calling someone foolish is a personal attack because you don't agree with the persons view that wrote the review. We have charter schools in Hillsdale were I live "Hillsdale MI"
The Academy seem to do well but the kids sports programs not so much. We have another charter school that use to do well but has been taking a hit here lately. My Grandfather was the Dean at Hillsdale College. We sent our daughter to Will Carleton Charter. We are not poor and I consider myself upper middle class. We bought our daughter good shoes, winter coats, ect... We were told her shoes were not good enough, her winter coat wasn't good enough ect... We finally had enough and pulled her and put her back in public schools. They lost 8 more children this year.

I believe this is a sister school to the Academy charter at Hillsdale College. They problem here is these are not Fortune 500 kids and our poverty rate alone is 31% in the City limits. Parents are sick of being degraded and Will Carleton is slowly going down hill because they are degrading parents. I personally can testify to this.

To me a charter school is only as good as it's staff and no school should degrade parents and tell them there shoes and winter coats are not good enough.

Joseph


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