Education

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Christian Science Monitor details how conservatives are fleeing to start-up colleges

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I’ve long been impressed with how the Christian Science Monitor manages to ferret out hidden trends and do a great job on complex, hard-to-nail-down topics.

If you want to see a perfect example of this, check out the Monitor's latest story on how poisonous the atmosphere in college campus has become for the typical conservative student, especially religions and moral conservatives.

These students may not quit the institution they’ve enrolled in, but they’re often permanently silenced for four years, knowing that once they express their views, they can become outcasts quickly.

Sooner or later, this is going to lead to news stories in lots of zip codes.

BOSTON -- As high school students across the US receive college acceptance letters, many are wrestling with the same kinds of questions: How much financial aid will I get? How far from home should I go? Are the course offerings what I want? 

But for conservative students, there’s often an additional, even more important factor to consider: Will the institution welcome, or at least tolerate, our viewpoints?

To hear many conservatives tell it, the answer on many campuses is increasingly, “No.” One student, a standout from a Christian academy, came to MIT last fall to pursue his passion, computer science. But during the freshman diversity training, though there was a theme of encouraging discussion between people of different backgrounds -- including different political backgrounds – he came away with a feeling that it favored a liberal point of view, especially on issues like sexuality and marriage. So he rarely discusses his perspective with fellow students.

Another, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, put a Trump-Pence sticker on his dorm room window, only to find it shattered. And a mother in Texas became afraid for her daughter’s safety after members of an organization she belonged to swore in a chat group they would ban or even kill anyone who voted for President Trump.

It’s not that college students tend to be liberal. Everyone knows that. It’s that one side believes their views are now being met with violence of various forms and that some professors are giving them failing grades for merely expressing their views.

It’s a whole new academic game.


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Hey Houston Chronicle, what does it mean that superintendent accused of bullying 'found God?'

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Yes, there's a religion angle in the case of a Houston-area school superintendent accused of bullying a classmate as a teen. More on that in a moment.

But first, the crucial background: The top story in Sunday's Houston Chronicle concerned the furor surrounding the leader of the 77,000-student Katy Independent School District, west of Houston.

Superintendent Lance Hindt has made national headlines since a man named Greg Barrett accused Hindt of bullying him as a teen.

“Lance, you were the one who shoved my head in the urinal,” Barrett told Hindt at a March 19 school board meeting.

The Chronicle noted:

Since then, Hindt’s tenure as superintendent has come under nationwide scrutiny amid questions about his leadership and how long someone should be held responsible for something they might have done as a teenager.
Hindt denied the incident, but the controversy continued to snowball as allegations surfaced that an 18-year-old Hindt had beaten a man into a five-day coma and had thrown weights at his teammates. Hindt canceled a scheduled interview last week with a Houston Chronicle reporter but answered questions by email.
“I was disappointed by the accusation because it simply was not me who was involved in the incident described,” Hindt wrote. “I by no means suggest that the gentleman was not bullied, only that I was not part of it. Bullying is wrong. Period.”
The allegations have left the community of over 300,000 divided, with a petition to terminate and another in support of the superintendent circulating on the internet. The two sides are squaring off on Facebook, and a few are lobbing hate email to board members and threats of violence against the superintendent and his family.

So far, no religion angle.

And honestly, I wasn't reading the story as a GetReligion media critic. I was simply interested in the subject matter.

But then — bam! — came the faith element:

Some are stunned that Hindt initially seemed to chuckle when the allegations were made and didn’t offer an apology. Hindt, who previously led the Allen and Stafford school districts, told staff in an email last week that he was not a perfect teenager and has since found God.

Alrighty. Now we've got a religion angle. My immediate question: Exactly what does it mean that Hindt has "found God?"


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WPost story on small-town gay activist vs. local Baptists raises more questions than answers

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There are times when I run across a very well-written piece that makes a poignant point and communicates an effective message. Yet, at the same time, there’s this uneasiness.

Such is a piece out this week in the Washington Post Magazine. With a headline that read “The Last Frontier for Gay Rights: A powerful liberal activist, a rural conservative town and a debate that won’t end,” it’s about a small North Carolina town.

I’ve written some 15 stories for the same magazine for the Post’s Style section, most of them profile or long-form narratives like this one. You may be familiar with the story I did last November for the magazine about Paula White, spiritual advisor to Donald Trump. So, I know how it takes months of hard work to produce these pieces and it sounds as though writer Tiffany Stanley spent a similar amount of time working on this article.

With few exceptions, the magazine has stuck to stories with relevance inside the Beltway. Since the residents of this western North Carolina county have nothing to do with Washington, D.C., I'm guessing the magazine, which got a new editor last year, is expanding its reach. There's a lot here, so please stick with me:

Word spread fast through the county that fall. Comments streamed across Facebook and in the halls of the high school and through the pews of churches: There was a gay-straight alliance starting up at Alexander Central High. It would be known as the P.R.I.D.E. Club: People Respecting Individuality, Diversity and Equality. Its detailed acronym notwithstanding, theories about it swirled.
There were rumors that the school would have “transgender restrooms,” or that a “homosexual-based curriculum” would be used in health and physical education classes. Some community members were upset about the school district’s lack of communication. A woman wrote in to the town newspaper: “It is heartbreakingly sad that our morals have come to this.”
The sense of siege extended to adults — on all sides of the controversy. Robbin Isenhour-Stewart, an art teacher and the club’s co-adviser, said she received “biblical hate messages” taped to her classroom door. The Rev. Phil Addison, a Southern Baptist minister, said he found trash on his lawn and his mailbox kept getting knocked down; he suspected it had to do with his public criticisms of the club. “I don’t know that it was them,” he told me, “but if not, it was a huge coincidence.” David Odom, a school board member, said his daughter came home asking why he was taking the Bible out of schools.

We hear next about a school board meeting packed with church members because their pastors asked them to attend. Also at the meeting was:


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Question for savvy reporters: Spot link between Toys R Us crisis and sobering trends in many pews?

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OK, here is a kind of think-about-it post that has been rumbling around in my mind for quite some time.

More and more, I am seeing stories about American religion that are linked to a very basic set of facts: Religious movements that (a) make converts, (b) have higher birthrates and (c) retain a high percentage of their young people have a better chance of thriving or surviving than those that do not.

All together now: #DUH. That's so obvious.

Well, if that is so obvious, why aren't more journalists asking questions about these trends when reporting some of the most important stories in American life and around the world?

Like what, you say? As noted many times here at GetReligion, this is clearly a factor in the declining number of Roman Catholic priests in America, as well as the painful closing of many religious schools. Note all the coverage of aging flocks in old-line Protestant denominations, the so-called "Seven Sisters." Are these factors relevant in the battles inside the United Methodist Church?

I've given this a name, as a twist on the old "demographics is destiny" slogan. That would be "doctrine is destiny." And, as I said, it's not just America. Look at the way birthrates are reshaping Italy. See this post: "Doctrine is destiny reference, concerning Italy's many churches and crashing birthrate." And that stunning new Benedict XVI Centre study on young people in Europe?

Now, it would be important to show that this affects many areas of life in America and elsewhere -- not just religion. Thus, I noticed this recent Washington Post "Wonkblog" piece about the decline and fall of a beloved chain in American commerce: "Toys R Us’s baby problem is everybody’s baby problem."

Here is the overture, leading to a blunt thesis:


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Evangelical colleges have much to say about the Billy Graham epoch and its aftermath

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Pundits say evangelical Protestantism, so long led by the late Billy Graham, is faltering in the United States (though not overseas) and split over Donald Trump-ism in politics and morals as well as certain religious differences.

Upon Graham’s passing, by handy coincidence, journalists can obtain fresh insight from the new “Fundamentalist U: Keeping the Faith in American Higher Education” (Oxford University Press) by Adam Laats, professor of educational history at Binghamton University. Unlike many scholars not personally part of  this subculture, Laats takes these believers seriously on their own terms, minus scholarly condescension.

Laats thinks dozens of Christian colleges undergird the movement’s cultural impact and political conservatism in the U.S. They also demonstrate the interrelations between militant “fundamentalists” and the somewhat more open “evangelicals.” His book and its very title apply those two tricky terms confusingly and interchangeably, but the details provide writers valuable context on the historical definitions.

He spent endless hours in archives at six non-denominational campuses to document their achievements and conflicts. (Laats largely bypasses theologically similar denominational colleges, seminaries, and ministries on secular campuses.) The findings would enrich a journalistic visit to profile one of these six. Fresh reporting will be essential because the book’s narrative largely trails off  before recent developments.

Here are the campuses, listed in order of founding.

* Wheaton College (of Illinois, not the Massachusetts Wheaton):  Graham’s alma mater has been a liberal-arts college throughout history that traces to 1853 with re-founding by slavery foes in Lincoln’s 1860. Selective and often dubbed the movement’s equivalent of Harvard, it leads evangelicalism’s elite vs. fundamentalism. But it remains staunchly conservative, recently forcing out a tenured professor over affinity with Islam, and winning federal court exemption from Obamacare’s contraception mandate.


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Key figure in Brown v. Board of Education case dies, and yes, there's a faith angle

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Before I became a religion writer, I covered education for The Oklahoman.

In 1997, as Oklahoma City public schools ended race-based crosstown busing, I traveled to Little Rock, Ark., and Topeka, Kan., to update readers on two of the nation's most important school desegregation battlegrounds.

My Topeka report mentioned Linda Brown, who — as you may have read — died this week at age 75. (And yes, there's a faith angle. Stay tuned for that!)

As a little girl, Brown was at the center of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision striking down the "separate but equal" doctrine, as I noted in my 1997 Oklahoman story:

The Rev. Oliver Brown and 12 other black Topeka parents sued because their children were forced to attend schools miles from home.
In those days, Topeka had 18 all-white elementary schools and four all-black elementary schools. The Browns lived four blocks from all-white Sumner Elementary. But Linda Brown had to walk seven blocks to catch a bus to all-black Monroe Elementary.

Given that Linda Brown was the daughter of a pastor, I wondered whether religion would figure in news stories about her death. In my Googling, I didn't find a whole lot about the faith angle. But the few links I discovered made the search worth it.

For readers wanting to know what really made Brown tick, CNN had the crucial details that many other reports lacked:


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Journalists have to ask familiar questions, when 'religious' people turn to violence

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There are so many questions to ask, and all of them need asking as journalists probe the "why" question in the "who," "what," "when," "where," "why" and "how" of the Austin bombings.

First things first. As Bobby Ross Jr. noted earlier (please see that post), 23-year-old Mark Anthony Conditt grew up in an intensely Christian home and he has expressed views that can -- in some sense of this vague word -- be called "conservative." He was active in a small, racially diverse church and then in a popular megachurch.

Well, the prodigal Texan in me wants to note that quite a few people in Texas go to church, even in the Austin area. Lots of them go to megachurches, since many things in Texas -- as you may have heard -- tend to be big.

Also, lots of people in Texas are committed to home-schooling their children. As with any form of intense education, some children like that more than others.

I say all of this to make one point: Journalists need to investigate all of these religion angles because this young man's faith -- or his loss of faith --  may turn out to be crucial. Most of all, law officials seem to be focusing on finding the source of the pain, anger and "darkness" that seized Conditt's life in the days, weeks or months leading up to the bombings.

Where would you start, reading between the lines in this passage from the main Associated Press report?

Conditt’s family said in a statement they had “no idea of the darkness that Mark must have been in.” ...

Jeff Reeb, a neighbor of Conditt’s parents in Pflugerville for about 17 years, said he watched Conditt grow up and that he always seemed “smart” and “polite.” Reeb, 75, said Conditt and his grandson played together into middle school and that Conditt regularly visited his parents, whom Reeb described as good neighbors.


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Trying to figure out why a tiny Christian school's financial problems are front-page news in Dallas

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As we at GetReligion frequently lament, the Dallas Morning News — which once boasted a team of religion writers — no longer has anyone covering the Godbeat.

That lack of focus and expertise shows up often in the Dallas newspaper's coverage of stories with religion angles.

I can't help but think that the Morning News — in its religion-writing heyday — would have offered a much more insightful treatment of a story on today's front page.

Actually, I'm not sure I can explain exactly why this particular story is Page 1 news in a major daily.

The basic story is that a small Christian school in the Dallas area is experiencing serious financial problems.

The somewhat opinionated lede:

Carrollton Christian Academy may soon need another miracle.
After struggling financially for years, officials at the tiny, faith-based school scrambled in December to raise $400,000 they said they needed to keep the doors open through the end of the school year.
In a matter of weeks, donors were able to raise enough money to keep the school afloat, and Carrollton Christian officials now say they believe they can complete the school term.
But court records, interviews and statements from school officials over the past few months cast a wide shadow of doubt about whether that confidence is merited.
"It is our plan to move forward, finish the year, re-enroll for next year," Principal Elaine Marchant said in an email Thursday. "But we are still working on financial planning."
It seems, though, that Carrollton Christian is always walking a financial tightrope, relying on crowdsourcing and even pleas through the media to help meet its basic obligations such as payroll for its 17 teachers, rent and insurance.


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What's the 'A Wrinkle In Time' news story? Flashback to wisdom from Madeleine L'Engle

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What's the 'A Wrinkle In Time' news story? Flashback to wisdom from Madeleine L'Engle

So what is the story with the new Disney version of the classic, Newbery Award winning novel "A Wrinkle In Time" by the late, great Madeleine L'Engle?

I'm talking about a news story here.

I'm talking about the attempt -- another one -- to make this beloved youth-fiction classic into a blockbuster movie. Why is it is causing discussion, debate and even controversy? Yes, I'm asking this because that's what we talked about this week in the GetReligion "Crossroads" podcast. Click here to tune that in.

Is it news because it appears, to one degree or another, to be a box-office flop? Is it news because, at Rotten Tomatoes, only 40 percent of critics like it? That's bad, but the score from ordinary people in theaters was even lower, to the tune of only 34 percent positive reactions.

Director Ava DuVernay was not amused and argued that race may have had something to do with it, since she -- as a star African-American director -- changed the racial mix of the cast.

It's clear that some of the movie's supporters thought race was a crucial part of the mix, as seen in this NBC commentary: " 'A Wrinkle in Time' isn't a film for critics. It's Ava DuVernay's love letter to black girls." And over at CNN there was this: "Watching 'A Wrinkle in Time' is a political act."

So one more question: Why write a religion column about this book and its author?

That's what I did this past week, for the Universal syndicate. It did that because, nearly two decades ago, I had a chance to spend two hours talking to L'Engle about the crucial themes woven into her book. In particular, I asked her if there were concepts and even quotations from her novel that needed to be in a film adaption of it. Here is a key piece of that column:

It would be hard, explained L'Engle, to grasp this book's cosmic war between life and death, good and evil, darkness and light without two crucial passages.


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