What is the true purpose of education? It’s not the acquisition of knowledge and skills. It’s not “college and career readiness.” It’s the cultivation of wisdom and virtue in the life of the student.

In Ephesians 6:4, Paul instructs Christian fathers to bring their children up “in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” This word translated discipline is the Greek word paideia, which refers to passing down one’s values and worldview. Passing along a Christian paideia does not need to be limited to a couple hours on Sunday or a few minutes before bedtime. It can, and should, include the daily seven-hour period in which children learn what the world is really like and how we exist within it. In classical Christian schools, teachers partner with parents in the discipleship of their children.

Classical Christian education trains the affections along with the intellect by treating goodness, truth, and beauty as objective measures of God’s world, not mere personal preferences. Teachers help children to love the good, the true, and the beautiful and reject what is evil, false, and ugly. Children will learn not only to appreciate these qualities around them, but also to reflect these things in their own lives.

Christian or secular, private or public, every form of education involves the passing down of values from teachers to children. The nature of education makes this unavoidable. The question is not whether values are being passed down. The question is whose values.

Modern public education is committed to a secular worldview in which traditional understandings of God, justice, and morality have been supplanted by scientism, progressivism, and moral relativism. Some of these “isms” are explicitly taught, but they’re more often caught as implicit elements of both curriculum and culture. Even public educators who attempt to remain neutral cannot help but reinforce the secular values of the system in which they serve.

Read this powerful quote from scholar Chris Schlect who describes his own public school experience:

“In not mentioning God, my public school teachers preached a thundering sermon every day. By implication, they taught that God is not relevant to most areas of human endeavor. The most destructive things I was taught in public school were not the outright falsehoods that were presented (e.g., I descended from apes, the Puritans were nasty people, etc.). The most destructive things I was taught were, by far, subtle lies about the character of God. Daily this lesson was reinforced to me: two and two are four, the Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776, and frogs breathe in water, regardless of whether or not Jesus Christ is Lord. I had been a theist since childhood, and I never relinquished this belief. But with every school lesson, in every class period, I was taught to think like an atheist. And I didn't even know that I was being indoctrinated.”

Classical Christian education understands that so-called neutrality is impossible, so it unapologetically teaches that nothing can be truly understood apart from the most foundational truth that Jesus Christ is Lord of all. Students learn reading, writing, mathematics, science, history, music, Latin, theology, apologetics and more — all through the lens of a Christian worldview.

The classical Christian school community provides a natural opportunity for families to create lasting bonds with one another. In this setting, parents have others with whom they can celebrate successes, share burdens, and work toward a common vision of educating their children.

Likewise, children develop lasting friendships as they learn and grow alongside peers who share their deepest convictions. Since the average American student will spend 16,000 hours in school from K–12, it’s not hard to imagine the impact this kind of community has on children over the course of their education.

None of these community benefits are meant to encourage separatism or isolation from an unbelieving world. Jesus indeed calls his followers to be salt and light. Classical Christian education prioritizes the spiritual formation of the child before sending him to be an ambassador to an unbelieving world.

Classical education is characterized by a return to educational principles that have withstood the test of time. Why a return? Many of these principles have either been forgotten or pushed aside to make way for so-called “progressive” education.

The liberal arts are the exercises in thinking that have long formed the core of the classical curriculum: grammar, logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. For centuries, our civilization’s greatest minds have mastered these arts, becoming liberated (hence the “liberal” arts) to see the world as it really is.

The first commandment with a promise is to “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.” Classical Christian education honors our Western civilizational heritage as an application of this commandment and promise. We don’t whitewash the sins of our ancestors, nor do we apologize for them. Instead, we count ourselves blessed to have received such a rich and virtuous inheritance from our cultural forefathers. From Plato to Shakespeare to C.S. Lewis, children at classical Christian schools learn to love our civilization’s greatest works from its greatest minds.

Proverbs 22:6 says, “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.” When parents partner with classical Christian schools in the discipleship of their children, the results are beautiful. Classical Christian education has been changing lives across the country for decades, and the movement continues to grow in both size and influence.

Classical Christian education is marked by academic rigor and high levels of post-graduate achievement. Data shows that students who graduate from classical Christian schools tend to score better than their peers on tests like the SAT and ACT, succeed at top colleges, and develop flourishing spiritual lives. You can read more about the impact of classical Christian education here: classicalchristian.org/measure-it