Educational alternatives- suggestions?

[theist]

 

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In Florida there is an accedited online school that is state sponsored.

 

The state knows the ecomomy of saving tax dollars with a e-school system.

 

My older kids tried it, but they couldn't get enough classes and it would have taken them too long to complete their High School diploma.

 

That was a few years ago. Maybe it has improved since then.

 

I think the idea of the e-school will become a big idea in the years to come.

 

It's better than home schooling in some ways, because the state is still offering the curriculum and it is free as best I can remember.

 

I don't know how many states are doing it, but I am sure Florida is not the only state to offer an online educational system.

 

 

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This post from the other thread struck me as maybe the best of alternatives. It seems very doable and the system may be moving in this direction anyway. No one, or govt. is going to set it up for us, nor should we expect that.

 

An e-system of education would remove the unwanted socialization that comes with the public school system environment and yet prepare kids for living within this society.

 

Although one person posted asking for advice I am sure this dilemna comes up for all devotee parents who afterall have to deal with this as a practical and often pressing real life event and not just an intellectual excercise.

 

Any positive ideas would be welcome.

[Guest guest]

The North Dakota School of Independent Study is a fully accredited distance

learning [online] institution in the United States offering instruction from Grades 4 - 12.

 

Students may submit work by mail, fax, email, or online.

 

If you google "North Dakota School of Independent Study" you can find their

website and what others think about it. Their e address is world wide web

period ndisonline period org.

 

Thank you for asking this very intelligent question.

[Kulapavana]

I am raising 3 kids. We tried local small gurukula when it was available. We tried to make it work but there were both social and scholastic problems there and within a couple of years the school closed. Homeschooling was not much of an option as we both worked. So the kids went to public schools, in a very rural, poor school district. It was not all bad, but certainly there are serious drawbacks to this option. My kids are quite well adjusted socially and spiritually. I'm not sure there is a perfect solution, short of having our own local school run by professional devotees - but there is neither the will, nor the material means to create such schools in our society.

 

E-school sounds good, but who will keep an eye on the kids on your end? You always need supervision. As a community we are trying to reconstitute a local gurukula. I hope we can do it, but it is not easy at all.

[Guest guest]

The North Dakota School of Independent Learning also accomodates students with special needs who just might need to take one class.

 

For example, if you live in another state and your child has discalculia [the inability to do math at grade level due to a miswiring of the brain] then your child can do things like go to their usual school [public or gurukula, what have you] for instruction that they understand readily at grade level

 

but instead of being in special ed class just for Math let's say, your child can take math classes at the North Dakota School of Independent Study to meet, say, the math requirement in order to graduate from high school.

 

Of course this costs money, as you have to hire your own psychologist to

test your child to determine their specific learning disability [unless you have your local school district do it, then its free].

 

Then once you do that, you have a "documented learning disability." The psychologist then prescribes suggested "waivers and accomodations" according to Section 504 of IDEA/ADA [Americans with Disabilities Act]

 

Next you present these waivers to both the North Dakota School of Independent Learning and your regular school [public or gurukula] and they can help your child to just take ONE course that you don't want them to take

in their regular [gurukula or otherwise] Gr 4-12 school...

 

because you want your child to have a special situation in which they can do their best. For some children with disabilities, this might mean: extended time, extended semester, having an adult isolate the problem, or providing a prompt but not the answer, etc.

 

In other words, you can also have your child just take ONE, or a few, classes at this school and if they pass it, the grade will go onto their official transcript to get into college.

 

Although America has its problems, as this is the material world and not our eternal home, so nothing is perfect here, it does have its strengths. And one of its strengths is it is one of the best countries in the world --if not THE best-- for remedial education and home-schooling.

 

In the United States, many home-schooled children have even made it into Ivy League colleges like Harvard and Yale. However, usually the parent had an advanced degree and/or was a teacher or professor and that parent was the teacher while the other parent worked.

 

This is a good argument for girls learning more than "cleaning, cooking, and

churning butter". Young ladies grow up to be women who will raise the next

generation of men and women by engaging in stri dharma.

 

Prabhupada thought that teaching and nursing are good careers for women to study in college, because they can apply it in their own home to fulfill stri dharma even if they never use it professionally.

 

Hope this helped. Hare Krishna!

[Guest guest]

I would like to say I applaud anyone who is taking the responsibility to care for a child. Prabhupada said, "Your children are your Deities." So I would like

to personally thank each and every devotee who is taking care of their Deities and trying to do their very best to serve them.

 

I would also like to thank anyone who feels motivated to be concerned about children's welfare, as you also are engaging in Deity worship by honoring and

respecting children. Prabhupada wanted us to protect the cows, brahmanas, elderly, women, and children.

 

So I thank you very much everyone who is doing this sacred Deity worship,

and supporting the "pujaris": those who are concerned about and who care for and nurture the children, our Deities.

 

All glories to you!

[theist]

 

The North Dakota School of Independent Study is a fully accredited distance

learning [online] institution in the United States offering instruction from Grades 4 - 12.

 

Students may submit work by mail, fax, email, or online.

 

If you google "North Dakota School of Independent Study" you can find their

website and what others think about it. Their e address is world wide web

period ndisonline period org.

 

Thank you for asking this very intelligent question.

 

Thanks for the info. Parents or potentials please take note.

[theist]

 

So the kids went to public schools, in a very rural, poor school district.

 

E-school sounds good, but who will keep an eye on the kids on your end? You always need supervision. As a community we are trying to reconstitute a local gurukula. I hope we can do it, but it is not easy at all.

 

I would pick a rural poor school anyday over these hellholes in the major cities.

 

Krsna will provide a local gurukula. If we have the will He provides the way.

 

The way I am picturing it is maybe 3 or 4 familes who are friends can pool their resources. Kids could study together sometimes or often and the responsibility for that shared.

[theist]

"Hope this helped. Hare Krishna!"

 

Sure did. That is the kind of practical specifics that we need. You are very experienced & knowledgable on this subject. I hope the original poster from the first thread is seeing this and taking notes. Hope others notice it as well.

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[theist]

"I would also like to thank anyone who feels motivated to be concerned about children's welfare,..."

 

Everyone should care especially devotees. Afterall Prabhupada brought Lord Caitanya's movement to engage the entire world. Now does it make sense for us to ignore the very souls that are placed in the wombs of devotee mothers by Krsna. Not only does it not make sense it is highly offensive. With kids or without makes no difference. That soul that has taken birth is just as much my brother or sister as he is to his birth parents. Of course the relationship is set up differently for practical reasons in this world but ultimately there is only one family. Headed by Krsna, centered on Krsna and expanded without limit.

 

Not to have some concern over devotee children is to show no genuine connection with Krsna IMO.

 

I may have an extra soft spot for this issue due to sentiment. My childhood was rather hellish with my parents giving no love, no concern of my education and even denying me food. So I supposed on some level I want to heal my inner child (O god ,I am embarassed to use that term) by seeing other kids well treated and happy.

[Guest guest]

If you want to get technical though, a gurukula in the traditional sense was FREE and the guru/teacher subsisted off of donations according to the ability to pay.

 

However, the gurukula concept school really hinged on there being a commune type or microcosm sub-culture community.

ISKCON did not really accomplish that goal of Srila Prabhupada in any really significant manner.

 

In a devotee community, there should be brahmanas who teach kids with some sort of state accredited curriculum (because it's the law) without a set tuition and familys pay according to their ability to pay.

 

Wealthier devotees could help subsidize the school while poor devotees pay less according to their income and ability to pay.

 

However, with the breakdown of ISKCON, the varnashrama communities that Srila Prabhupada envisioned thus haven't manifested yet in a very significant way.

 

I don't see ISKCON ever becoming the megalithic Vaishnava society that it possibly could have been.

 

Thus, devotees are left to form smaller communities and to try and establish some semblence of a Varnashrama society for the benefit of human society.

[Guest guest]

From "Still Here: Embracing Aging, Changing and Dying" by Ram Dass

p. 102 Chapter "The Gift of Service"

 

"Three years ago in Brazil I made an offhand remark that I later thought was

important. There is a relationship between what we need to learn and what we do in the world.

 

" I said, 'It's interesting when you stop thinking of spiritual practice as what you do on your meditation cushion and realize that...what we do in the world--our dharma--IS our spiritual practice.'

 

"Dozens of people approached me afterwards to say that this idea had rung true for them, and helped them to see the roles that they played in the world

differently."

 

I also have suffered callous insensitivity at the hands of my biological parental units and subsequent guardians. [um, I think we all have on the wheel of samsara actually].

 

I remember watching the "Peter Pan" Disney movie as a child and when they sang, "I won't grow up!" I remember making a vow to please, please, please don't EVER let me forget what it feels like to be a child.

 

Later on, I felt very grateful to discover that according to Sanatana Dharma

we are all actually innocent children. And not only is it our real constitutional position, but it is even more permanent and real of an identity than I ever imagined or dreamed possible!

 

So I feel that "healing our inner child" might refer not only to the psychological task of middle age, i.e. "Ego Integrity versus Despair" [according to Abraham Maslow] but also something deeper than that.

 

It might also refer to: by mitigating all of our past karmas, we can purify ourselves and discover the true nature of our innermost deepest essence: which is deeper than our psychological inner child. Our innermost inner child is our primordial identity as a spark of saccidananda.

 

"...The scriptures say, 'smvantu visve amrtasya putrah': we are the children of the Lord..." BV Vamana Maharaja, Vishwa-Vaisnava-Raj-Sabha: Journal of Prema-Nama-Sankirtana. Volume Four, 2000.

 

"...The Vedas say, 'srnvantu visve amrtasya putrah': we are the sons and

daughters of nectar, the children of the Lord..." Srila Bhakti Raksaka Sridhar Maharaja, Sermons from the Guardian of Devotion. 1989.

 

"...'srnvantu visve amrtasya putrah': we are the children of amrta, the children of the Lord. We are the sons and daughters of nectar, the ocean of immortality and happiness..." BV Narayana Maharaja Sri Prabhandavali: A Collection of Devotional Essays.

 

Who we really are, our deepest essence, is full of knowledge never-ending, exuberant and energetic vitality eternal, and full of unstoppable happiness and bliss. I mean if that is not child-like then I don't know what is.

 

Sanatana Dharma is so wonderful of a gift: to learn that yes we are eternally children and in a way that is better than any Disney movie, and deeper than

any temporary psychological identity.

 

How wonderful to truly feel, know, and experience that we are saccidananda. And one way that we can feel so very close again to our Eternal Parent [who like us is comprised solely of Saccidananda] is by calling out Their Names "like the genuine crying of a child for his mother" [ACBVSP].

 

I thank everyone who has shared the incredible gift of this knowledge with the West and with the world, and who is courageously choosing to try their level best to dynamically live it, to the best of their knowledge, ability, and understanding, every possible moment of each day. A worthwhile endeavor indeed!

 

"...The Supreme Absolute Truth is all accomodating and everything is beautifully harmonized in Him. This is the teaching of all true religions and

especially of the Vedic sanatana dharma. If someone desires to attain that Absolute Truth and follows a religion that cannot accomodate the feelings

of others,

 

"then that so-called religion is in fact not a true religion. It is sectarianism and such sectarianism that ignores the conception of harmony

results in fanaticism, extremism, or terrorism of the kind that is prevalent in the world today..." Editor Abhay Charan De [the future AC Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada], Sri Bhagavat Patrika, 1950.

 

All glories to the assembled devotees!

Om tat sat.

[theist]

 

Who we really are, our deepest essence, is full of knowledge never-ending, exuberant and energetic vitality eternal, and full of unstoppable happiness and bliss. I mean if that is not child-like then I don't know what is.

 

Yes. We must become as little children to enter the kingdom of God.- Teachings of Jesus Christ