Morality: Can Our Schools Afford to do without it - Essay Example

here 10 August Morality: Can Our Schools Afford to Do without It? Ever since moral standards were essentially removed from public schools in 1963, immorality in the United States has been on the incline. After the ruling of the landmark United States Supreme Court case Abington Township School District v. Schempp prohibited school-led prayer and Bible reading, public schools throughout the nation have taken these restrictions to a higher level ever since, effectively making most forms of prayer and Bible reading taboo and punishable anywhere on campus. Even through the phrase “separation of church and state” occurs nowhere in the U.S. Constitution, activist groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State have used campaigns of fear, intimidation, and misinformation with the threat of lawsuits to keep school districts from allowing any form of religion on their campuses. However, First- and Fourteenth- Amendment rights clearly allow all citizens, including students, the free exercise of their religion. However, the point to be made is not that schools should be teaching religion; it is that schools should not actively work to eradicate all aspects of religion from our public schools, including morality. Since public schools have done away Judeo-Christian morality, a dangerous climb in immorality and unaccountability rates has swept our nation. To curb this socially destructive tide, superintendants and principals need to reintroduce the teaching of moral absolutes to our schools in place of the politically correct doctrine of “tolerance” – a constantly evolving principle that says, “anything goes,” “if it feels good, do it,” and “there is no right and wrong.” Eliminating morality from our public schools is a disservice to youth and the nation as a whole, as the secular teaching of so-called “tolerance” does little to protect students and lead them toward responsible and upright behavior. After biblical morality was shunned through the Supreme Court decision nearly five decades ago, a surge of violence began sweeping across the nation, as the adolescent arrest rate increased by 50 percent and adolescent weapons violations rose 108 percent from 1963 to 1993 (United States Census Bureau, Federal Bureau of Investigation). During this same period, the violent crime rate for the general public skyrocketed 363 percent (Ibid). When Judeo-Christian ethics were no longer welcomed in public schools, this ushered in a torrent of immoral behavior, as many students ceased to be instructed that they were accountable for their own actions and that the concepts of right and wrong were only subjective constructs that individuals made up in their own minds. Therefore, students have been given no basis for appropriate moral standards within the schools and, as a result, have looked toward the popular culture ? seen through Hollywood and the media ? to form their value systems. The mission of public schools is to not only to prepare students academically to be productive contributors to the economy; it is to build upright citizens that will edify society. This can only be done when superintendants realize that their faculty and staff must demonstrate and teach high moral standards to the student body. A sharp rise in irresponsible, reckless, and immoral sexual behavior also began after 1963. Sex only within the institution of marriage was quickly replaced with “free love” and situational ethics, where moral standards no longer applied to everyone, but were conveniently customized to accommodate individuals’ unbridled sexual appetites. As a result, unmarried birth rates escalated by 181 percent from 1963 to 2001 (United States Census Bureau, National Center for Health Statistics), as more and more children were being raised without a father, greatly increasing their likelihood of engaging in socially deviant behavior. And with the loosening morals, marriage was no longer a prerequisite for many couples to live together, as unwed domestic partnerships jumped 577 percent from 1963 to 2000 (United States Census Bureau, Fertility and Family Statistics Branch). With the rise in sexual unions out of wedlock on the rise, sexually transmitted diseases such as gonorrhea spiked from coast to coast, rising 58 percent from 1963 to 1985 (United States Department of Health and Human Services). Free love ended up being not very free at all, greatly costing the lives, health, and taxpayers dollars over the next several decades. When students received education at school telling them that safe and responsible sex only consists of contraception and a willing partner, unwise and immoral decisions were made, as children and society at large ended up suffering as a result. This kind of moral relativism taught in the class room had long-ranging and detrimental effects not only on children’s lives, but on the society as a whole – including financial burdens on family members and taxpayers alike. In order for this country to recover from the sexual libertinism that has swept this nation since biblical morality was thrown out of the schools, school boards, superintendants, and faculty must band together and revise the current curricula so that students understand that abstinence until marriage is the most healthy, beneficial, and responsible decision they can make for their physical and mental well being. Delinquent behavior is not the only result of an increasingly secular moral code taught and espoused in public schools, as administrators would be wise to note that infusing high ethical standards back into the curriculum would help to deter poor academic performance. But what is the connection between high grades and high morals? With moral behavior comes a higher sense of responsibility and accountability for one’s actions, and this includes performance inside the classroom. This connection between the removal of biblical values and lower school achievement can be evidenced when looking at Scholastic Aptitude Scores of public school students from 1963 to 2000, which are marked by a 61-point drop (College Entrance Examination Board). During the years before 1963, the scores were relatively constant, as students were consistently exposed to the moral absolutes taught in the Bible at that time. But when biblical morality and Judeo-Christian ethics were replaced with modern psychology, experimental drugs, and the new sexual ethics ushered in during the hippy generation of the 1960s, students’ grades dropped, along with their moral standards. If teachers, principles, and superintendents really want to see an improvement in student performance, they would be wise to start by giving youth the moral guidance they need through instruction that promotes high moral standards through Judeo-Christian values. But does maintaining the same moral relativism in regards to sexuality really make that big of a difference to schools as a bureaucratic machine? Are parents and children concerned about the lower moral standards, wanting to disconnect themselves from destructive secular trends that have perpetuated in public schools for decades? Back in 1960, a few years before the biblical code of morality was kicked out of the schools, only about 10,000 students were homeschooled – most of them because their left-leaning parents believed the schools were too conservative in their teaching on a number of social, economic, and political issues. But after socially deviant behavior escalated beginning in 1963, and the effects of removing moral absolutes from the schools manifested both inside and outside campus gates for two decades, many conservative parents decided that they had enough, as the first bump in homeschool numbers appeared in the 1980s (Ray 2). For the school year of 2005, it was estimated that the number of homeschooled children in America was 3.5 million, with an overwhelming percentage of these students coming from Christian homes that lost confidence in the public school system’s antagonistic and hostile treatment of virtually anything religious in nature (Ray 84). This translates to 350 times more homeschoolers over a 45-year period. Many parents feel that public schools have lost touch with society and move forward with their secular teachings, regardless of the negative effects that they have on society. With the increased numbers of students leaving the schools, it is time for superintendants and principals alike to recognize that the moral relativism taught in their schools has a detrimental effect not only on society at large, but on the public school population, as well. Action steps must be taken by administrators to re-infuse the moral training in public school curricula so that low academic performance and high delinquency rates will not perpetuate the exodus of students from their campuses. With the punctuated rise in anti-social behaviors and decline in school achievement, what kind of solutions must school boards and district superintendents examine to bring about a turnaround? First of all, public school administrators have the responsibility of knowing their constitutionally protected rights. They must not succumb to the intimidation of groups such as the ACLU and the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which constantly threaten school districts with frivolous lawsuits, demanding that any form of religion, including Judeo-Christian ethics, must be totally expelled from the schools. School officials must realize that the so-called “separation of church and state” is not based in the United States Constitution, and realize that the concept was primarily conceived so that the government would not interfere with the way citizens practiced their religion. Atheist activist groups also contest that the Establishment Clause forbids schools from allowing any form of religious activities or teachings on public school campuses. This is yet another fallacy that school officials must recognize as just another scare tactic. For centuries – and still today – hundreds of school districts constitutionally allow books of the Bible to be taught as historical documents. Of course, teachers cannot use Scripture to evangelize or do alter calls from the lectern; but using parts of the Bible to teach lessons in morals, history, sociology, archaeology, etc. has never been prohibited by federal or state law. Bringing the rich teachings of Judeo-Christian heritage back into the classrooms would be a major step forward in producing higher rates of upstanding citizens out of our school systems – as this nation did nearly 50 years ago. Even though there is no specific, ultimate, universal curricula that school boards and superintendents should implement across the nation, they would take a step in the right direction by examining literature, textbooks, and curriculum standards that are firmly grounded in Judeo-Christian values – applying principles that guided the moral development of our society since the founding of our nation. The social experimentation of inducing our schools with socialist and atheistic teachings has miserably failed, and it is time to return to the instruction that generates productive and responsible citizens – not misguided and morally confused social deviants. Instead of filling curricula with literary works that reflect the declining moral condition of society – casting premarital sex, foul language, violence, disrespect for authority, lying, cheating, gambling, drug use, drinking, etc in a positive or intriguing light – school officials must insert literature and lessons that provide students with moral and responsible role models who have solid ethical standards. Churches and religious views should cease to be looked down upon as anti-intellectual, backwards, and bigoted. The creation account of Genesis should not be frowned upon as anti-science, while evolution is touted as scientific fact, especially when much scientific evidence today points to the accuracy of the biblical flood account and the unworkability of many evolutionary processes. By science teachers telling students that evolution is fact and creation is fiction, they are, in essence telling them that the Bible is an inaccurate and unworthy source from which to build one’s faith and beliefs. As a result of this kind of macro-evolution dogma, many publicly schooled children end up losing their faith in the Bible and walk away from the moral standards from which they were raised. School administrators must begin to see the dire need to expose students to higher values through bringing Judeo-Christian influences, themes, and instruction back into classrooms. But some may ask, why not teach moral standards based in Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, or some other world religion? The very laws and underpinnings from which this nation was established centered around the Bible and its teachings. Ninety-seven percent of the founders of this nation were strong believers in the Bible, and the foundational documents that form the backbone of our legal system ? including the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution ? acknowledge the God of the Bible as the One from Whom our unalienable rights are given. Many of today’s ethical standards and laws are rooted in the Ten Commandments, including, “Honor your father and your mother…. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife…” (NIV Study Bible, Exo. 20.12-17a). These timeless standards ? along with the first four commandments ? used to be posted in public school classrooms as a reminder for students to live godly, moral lives. Today, the presence of The Commandments in a classroom would likely draw more attention as something evoking a lawsuit rather than something by which to glean wisdom and moral guidance. But regardless of the political climate in schools today that is hostile to Christianity and biblical teachings, many books of the Bible are listed as approved curricular sources. In the Los Angeles Unified School District, more than 40 of the Bible’s 66 books can be taught in the classroom as historical, classical literature. Yet, out of a naive and unfounded fear of litigation, most teachers and principals are hesitant – or downright opposed – to allowing the Bible to be taught in the classroom. And many would be surprised to learn that the Bible was the foundational text of many early schools in this nation. In fact, both Yale and Harvard ? which are generally hostile to biblical teachings today ? were founded as Bible schools. Bringing the Bible and its moral influences back into the public classroom would prove to be the first major step of school officials to commence a new wave of accountable and high-performing students. Moral training is also recognized as an extremely important fact of education in India, where elected officials stress that teaching in ethical behavior is crucial to raising well developed youth. Even though India is rooted in Hindu beliefs, as opposed to Judeo-Christian values, the education establishment in the second most populated nation in the world sees the teaching of right and wrong as an integral and vital part of instruction for the nation’s youth. In fact, last May, Jammu and Kashmir Governor N. N. Vohra stressed that ethical and moral values in schools is essential to ensure the complete development of Indian youth, “It will be beneficial if all education and training institutions organize periodic lectures on ethical and moral values and an appropriate percentage of the overall marks assigned to this segment of learning, (Vohra for Ethical and Teachings). Raising children with moral guidelines by which to live is deemed as so critical in India that the governor steps in to guide and direct school officials and instructors to implement curriculum that teaches a sense of right and wrong. The educational system in India would be wise to enforce elected officials’ directives to instill moral values into students through coursework that trains them to become upstanding citizens in their society. The moral and academic problems facing our youth today has reached virtually epidemic proportions, and statistics show that this decline can be attributed to the removal of biblical morality in the schools – a trend that school officials must reverse by reintroducing Judeo=Christian values into the classroom. But many educators and politicians say the problem is that schools need more money – as opposed to morality training. Yet in 2003, Washington, D.C. and New York State had the highest per student expenditures in the nation at approximately $12,000 per student, while their graduation rates ranked 46th and 45th in the nation, respectively (Wiesenfeld, et al. 290). Utah, spending the least per student at about $5,000, had the third highest graduation rate, which goes to show that more funding does not equal better performance. However, statistics over the past few decades do show that the absence of moral instruction in schools has the effect of lowering school performance and raising delinquent behavior. With this in mind, school board members, superintendents, principles, administrators, and teachers alike need to find ways to work Judeo-Christian teachings and morals back into the curricula across the nation in order to usher in a new breed of high-performing and morally sound productive members of American society. Works Cited America’s Families and Living Arrangements: March 2000, Current Population Reports, Series P20-537, United States Census Bureau, Fertility and Family Statistics Branch, 2001. Washington, D.C.: United States Printing Office, 2001. CD-ROM. College Bound Seniors, 2002. The College Board. New York: The College Entrance Examination Board, 2002. Print. Donlan, T.F, Ed. The College Board Technical Handbook for the Scholastic Aptitude Test and Achievement Test. New York: College Entrance Examination Board, 1984. Lines, Patricia. “Homeschooling Comes of Age.” The Public Interest, No. 140, 2000 Summer. New York: The Public Interest, 2000. Print. Ray, Brian D. Strengths of Their Own: Homeschoolers across America. Salem: National Home Education Research Institute, 1997. Print. Rudner, Lawrence M. “Scholastic Achievement and Demographic Characteristics of Home School Students in 1998.” Educational Policy Analysis Archives 7 (8). Phoenix: Educational Policy Analysis Archives, 1999. Print. Sexually Transmitted Diseases Surveillance, 1993. United States Department of Health and Human Services, Division of STD/HIV Prevention. Atlanta: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1997. CD-ROM. Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2002 (122nd Edition). United States Census Bureau, United States Bureau of Investigation, 1993. Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, 2002. CD-ROM. 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