Parents in the Secaucus and surrounding area navigate some of the most academically competitive yet ideologically progressive public schools in New Jersey. Does faithful Christian parenting require pulling children out, or can families salt and light those public school halls?
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Add your commentI appreciate the zeal in some of these comments but I've seen the OTHER side of this too. I grew up in a very strict homeschool environment — Christian curriculum, the whole thing — and came out completely unprepared for college, for relationships, for disagreement. Socially stunted doesn't even cover it. My faith actually collapsed in my early 20s partly BECAUSE I had never had to defend it against anything real. Homeschooling done badly can produce fragile faith, not strong faith. Just being honest with y'all.
Born and raised in Secaucus, went through the public schools here in the 90s, and honestly the difference between then and now is night and day. My kids come home with stuff that directly contradicts what we teach at home. At what point does "salt and light" become an excuse to just let the culture disciple your children instead of you doing it? I pulled my two youngest out last year and I have zero regrets. This isnt a preference anymore, its a calling.
someone needs to say it — the families asking this question are usually the ones who are already engaged, already discipling their kids, already in church every week. The kids who are really at risk are the ones whose parents aren't even having this conversation online. So maybe less energy debating homeschool vs public school and more energy helping the single moms and unchurched families in our own congregations who have no support system either way??
ok so genuine question for the homeschool crowd — who exactly is doing the homeschooling? because around here both parents are working. we're not in some suburb where one parent can just opt out of the economy. rent in hudson county doesn't care about your theology. some of us dont have the luxury of this being a "preference OR responsibility" debate lol
I've lived in three states and I want to push back on something. Hudson County public schools being "highly rated" academically doesn't automatically make them spiritually dangerous. Academic rigor and secular curriculum are not the same thing as active hostility to faith. Some of you are conflating "they don't pray in school" with "they're attacking Christianity." Those are very different situations and the response to each should be different too.
I teach Sunday school at a church off Paterson Plank Road and I want to challenge any parents reading this: when did you last actually sit down and READ your kids curriculum? Not just look at the folder — actually read it? Because I promise you the school isnt hiding what they're teaching. Its right there. Once you read it you can make an informed decision instead of reacting to what you heard someone else say their cousin experienced. Do the homework before you blow up your whole family schedule over a rumor.
Hard disagree. Jesus ate with sinners, walked into hostile territory, engaged culture head-on. You think sheltering your kid in a homeschool bubble prepares them for ANY of that? My daughter is in 8th grade at the middle school, she knows what she believes and WHY she believes it, and she has more gospel conversations with classmates than most adults I know at church. Train your kids. Don't just hide them.
Fun fact: the homeschool movement was actually started largely by a liberal educator named John Holt who had nothing to do with Christianity. So when we act like homeschooling is this distinctly Christian tradition we're kind of rewriting history. That said I do think Christian parents have ALWAYS had a responsibility to be the primary disciplers of their kids — Deuteronomy 6 doesn't say "outsource this to the school district."
My family just relocated from the Midwest six months ago and I am genuinely shocked at how different the culture is here even compared to what I expected from New Jersey. Back home the public school was a little edgy. Here my son's first week of 5th grade involved a presentation that I had to have a two-hour debrief conversation about. Two hours. Week one. We are actively looking into the Riverbend Christian community and homeschool co-ops in the area if anyone has contacts please message me.
Can we stop pretending this is even a real dilemma? Scripture is abundantly clear. Proverbs 22:6. Ephesians 6:4. The responsibility of Christian education falls on the FATHER, period. The public school system was not designed to raise covenant children and it never will be. Every year you leave your kid in that system is a year the world gets to catechize them before you do. This isn't legalism, this is just reading the Bible.
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