What time is it? The importance of such a simple question should not be underestimated. Jesus, after all, castigated his opponents for failing to rightly "interpret the signs of the times" (Matt 16:3), which led them to miss the coming of the Messiah. Much better, then, for us to be like the men of the tribe of Issachar, who rallied to David because they "had understanding of the times" (1 Chr 12:32). How we as Christians read the present cultural moment greatly impacts how we approach the task of educating our children.

In seeking to discern the signs of our times, Aaron Renn's "Three Worlds of Evangelicalism" is a very helpful way of analyzing how Christians have engaged and been received in the public square as the process of secularization has proceeded in America. Most notably, Renn identifies a shift that took place around 2014 from what he calls the "Neutral World" to what he terms the "Negative World." Whereas the former was characterized by a lingering receptivity to Christian beliefs and morality, the remnants of a "Positive World" that saw Christian morality as normative for society and linked Christian faith with good citizenship, the latter is strikingly hostile to traditional Christianity, imposing a genuine cost, social and otherwise, to those who would seek to follow Christ.

How, then, does this impact how we think about Christian education?

In the "Neutral World," we saw the growth of Christian college-preparatory schools, which aimed to prepare graduates to engage culture on its own terms, including on the most elite secular college campuses and in the most prestigious professions. Their aspiration is often captured in mission statements regarding graduating students who will "transform their world for Christ" or something of that nature.

In the "Neutral World" it may have been possible to find missional success through a strategy of downplaying controversial issues and seeking to find common ground with culture at large. Even then, however, this strategy may have been less successful than its advocates claimed; those Christians who rose to positions of power and influence often found themselves more transformed by the institutions in which they served than vice versa. In any event, in the "Negative World" it appears far less likely that simply having a "winsome" Christian witness will win over society, much less be able to resist those de-formative pressures increasingly brought to bear upon young people today.

And therein lies the rub for the Christian college-preparatory school model: to the extent that its telos is bound up in prestigious college admissions and career success, it is vulnerable to the pressures of society more broadly and college admissions offices more specifically. The pressure in the "Negative World" will always be to compromise away from traditional Christian orthodoxy, to chip away at the school's mission in order to allow for graduates to still achieve worldly "success." Unfortunately, it is all too common to see a Christian vocabulary applied to the various aspects of a school's work without any actual transformation of what the school is doing or how it is operating. While this tension may have been present in the college-preparatory model from the beginning, the shift to the "Negative World" will only further destabilize this approach to Christian education as it imposes ever greater costs in pursuit of its stated aim.

There is, thankfully, another option available to Christian parents. In this "Negative World," classical Christian education provides a durable alternative to the model of Christian college-preparatory schooling. As many ACCS schools have demonstrated, it is possible to avoid the de-formative pressures of the college-preparatory model without slipping into a fundamentalist, anti-intellectual, world-denying posture. The telos of cultivating goodness, truth, and beauty by preserving and transmitting the Great Tradition that is our common heritage anchors schools like Stonehaven amidst the tides of liquid modernity. It will, we hope, be graduates of schools like ours that will be best poised to rebuild our colleges, workplaces, and communities when our national collective fever breaks and the work of rebuilding begins anew.

Undoubtedly, there are many Christian college-preparatory schools staffed with teachers and administrators of true conviction who are doing their best to form their students for Christ. How much more, though, should we in the classical Christian education movement lead the way in creating the kinds of Christian schools that will not only survive but thrive in the "Negative World" and whatever else may lie ahead. Let us, then, be prepared to stand, contra mundum, for the sake of Christ our King.

Note: This post is adapted from an article Dr. Hughes wrote for the ACCS magazine Classis: Kyle R. Hughes, "Christian Education in the Negative World," Classis 30.3 (2023): 9-11.

One of the most common questions surrounding the classical Christian movement is, "What about STEM?" This is a question that our leadership has given deep consideration. When designing our science curriculum, we must ask, "Are we preparing our students well for future careers in engineering and technology?" And more generally, "Are we preparing our students to contribute in a meaningful way to a world that is driven largely by innovation and emerging technologies?" I would answer both of these questions with a resounding, "Yes!" Beginning with our youngest students, we want to instill a sense of wonder and curiosity about our world and our Creator. Introducing Nature Studies in the early grammar years trains students to attend to God’s natural world through careful observation. Contemplative observation leads to questions; seeking answers to those questions leads to discovery, and discovery leads to wonder. Cultivating wonder for God's creation and God, Himself, is the driving purpose behind science education at Stonehaven. Additionally, a rigorous Upper School science curriculum combined with logic and advanced rhetoric classes that teach students how to think critically and form sound arguments lay a foundation that will aid students in whatever vocation they pursue. In other words, we believe that teaching students how to think and giving them the tools to be lifelong learners (rather than teaching students specific skills that will be outdated in the next few years) will prepare students to have a long-term impact in STEM careers.

To learn more about this subject, check out the January 11th episode of BaseCamp Live, Classical Science as an Alternative to STEM with Jim Dolas (link below).

Navigating race conversations with our children can be challenging. Unfortunately, five-year olds don't give us a heads up before asking, "Hey daddy, why is Adam's skin color darker/lighter than mine?" It is inevitable that our children will recognize such distinctions. Parents are confronted with an internal debate: Do we talk about race or do we not talk about race?

The idea of color-blindness has come under attack in our current culture. At times, for good reason. Some people proudly claim, "I don't see color" or "I act like race doesn't exist." Such statements are neither true nor helpful. It is possible that some parents hope to nurture children that "don't see color" by simply avoiding the conversation altogether. At an age appropriate time, parents should not shy away from having conversations about race with their children.

However, there is a healthy notion of color-blindness that is consistent with the message of Scripture. The apostle Paul says, "There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:28). Paul is not arguing that these distinctions do not exist but rather that they do not affect a person's status or access to God. The color-blindness we should pursue is not one that ignores race but rather one that strives to treat people without regard to race, in our public policy and private lives. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. used similar color-blind language in his I Have a Dream speech saying, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character... we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, Black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: Free at last. Free at last. Thank God almighty, we are free at last."

This weekend, my son asked me, "What does Charlotte Mason believe about education?" My response could've gone a lot of directions. For simplicity, I decided the best way to answer this question was to reference another person he was familiar with, "Son, imagine if Beatrix Potter was a teacher and started a school, what do you think it would look like?"

Over the weekend, an impressive group of Stonehaveners followed our Nature Studies aficionado Mrs. Harvey in an exploration of the Beatrix Potter: Drawn to Nature exhibit at the High Museum. The exhibit is a beautiful display of "Beatrix's creative pursuits across illustration, scientific observation, narrative building, and preservation. Discover the boundless creativity, imagination, and curiosity of the woman behind the famous tales." This was a timely reminder for me of our school's love of nature and our desire to create time and space in our schedule for children to stand still before God's creation.

Charlotte Mason believes that, "Children are born naturalists... every child has a natural interest in the living things about him which it is the business of his parents to encourage." As a school partnering with parents, we must take on this responsibility as well. We are to design an academic program that excites our children to appreciate "the marvels of plant and animal life." As we begin a new year, I am excited to recommit our school to this vision and consider the imaginative programs and spaces that we can create to help instill a wonder and awe of God's creation in our children.

When the wheels get a little wobbly with our children's routines and behaviors in the Edwards household, my wife will often proclaim a return to "Boot Camp week!" This generally means that we put a heavy focus on cleaning, organizing, and any other routines that don't naturally find themselves at the top of our children's to-do lists. Video games, nerf guns, and Legos are put away as we reteach our children the routines we desire to see in our home.

At Stonehaven, we will see a similar return to "Boot Camp" this week as our children return from their Christmas holiday. Before we open up our math books and play soccer on the playground, teachers and staff will retrain their students on the important procedures that form the daily aroma of our school culture. How to walk through our hallways, how to clean up after lunch, how to submit a homework assignment, and how we quickly line up at the end of recess. We know at Stonehaven that when our students aren't following a particular routine, it is more often the result of a lack of training than a lack of knowledge.

In our school's Foundational Commitments, we state that "true education recognizes that hearts and minds are shaped not by ideas and knowledge only but also by practices, habits, routines, and liturgies." New Year's is a perfect opportunity to press the reset button on the habits in our home and the habits in our school. When parents and school can do this at the same time, it can have a powerful impact.