Imagine something different: The case for new evangelical parochial schools

Not too long ago, my husband and I were watching a series of interviews with famous directors.  In one interview, a director contrasted the difficulties in his early career with his current acclaim.  It's funny, he said, that the same ideas that get you fired early in your career are what you get awards for later.

This is one of those ideas.

What if evangelical churches were able to come together to create their own regional parochial schools?

But what about existing private Christian schools? you may ask.  Or maybe you think, But the public schools in my neighborhood are really good!  Or, That's a nice idea, but we're already homeschooling.  Let me answer each question separately, with a final emphasis on what would make this idea a real game-changer.

Grants don't work: The short-term, non-solution for education reform

As I mentioned in my previous post, "Why Did I Quit Teaching?," I had some encouragement from others to go into freelance grant writing before I got my job as a teacher.  Unfortunately, the Great Recession coincided with my resignation, and I spent three years unemployed.  It was a difficult time for me and I was pretty discouraged.  I had to give up my apartment and live with my parents for about a year until my husband and I got married.  Besides the twin storm clouds of "What should I do with my life?" and "I failed at my first real job" looming over my head, career-oriented job openings were slim and multiple interviews were followed days later with a thin envelope or short email notifying me that another candidate had been selected for the position, or the position itself had been canceled.

So after we got married, my husband encouraged me to find some volunteer work to do that would at least help me get some skills in another field.  I thought that non-profit organizations might be more welcoming of my writing skills and liberal arts background than for-profit corporations, and that would give me a better chance of networking my way to a job.  Since we didn't have a lot of money to spend on gas, I looked for the closest non-profit and found a local high school education foundation a few miles down the road. I emailed its director, offering to volunteer.