Public School, Islamic School or Home School?
Salam,
I hope you guys are thinking about where your going to send your kids to get their education, As a wise man said ” We need Muslims with two eyes, one for the deen, and for education”, But most importantly be productive members of society and abide by the law and contribute to the betterment of Quality of Muslim life in North America. Not only for ourselves but obviously for the upcoming generation.
But seriously we all know the reality of the high schools here in America, drug abuse, drug business, peer pressure, alcohol,dating, and anything else that you probably have witness or experienced as a result of the crowds and culture that has diseased the school systems.
On the other hand, when i talk to brothers who attend Islamic School then i hear stories like girls taking off their hijab as soon as they get out or brothers and sisters dating each other on the low low or smoking drugs secretly because of the strictness and rules they have to follow. Its interesting because although they are going to Islamic School, they are still involved in this lifestyle and don’t understand the most important thing which is “Allah is watching”.
Where does one go in making sure that not only is the kid comfortable in the school but at the same time not trapping him and making him an alien in society, i feel like alot of kids who are raised with this over protectiveness then sort of have sudden exposure to things that are haram get overwhelmed by it and go astray. Another challenge is afford ability, alot of parents would love for their kids to attend Islamic Schools, but obviously they can’t afford it, I think Islamic Schools need to get more affordable but also improve the quality of education and raise their standards.
The reality is that its bad out there and while we are trying real hard to build Islamic Schools, we should also not isolate ourselves from our presence in contributing to the institutions that have already been built for our kids. Alot of Islamic Schools are being built but the money that is being put into it isn’t giving progress as much as it should. So don’t you think we should save all the time and money and just put our kids in public school, and if enough of them go there with the right purpose and understanding then perhaps they can bring dawah to these public schools where Muslims and non Muslims go and bring about change or even have msa’s.
Mashallah in Illinois a Model Islamic School has opened The place that’s preparing these young Americans for life in their own country, “from crayons to college,” as its slogan promises, is the Universal School, an Islamic institution teaching 638 students in pre-K through 12th grades in Bridgeview, Ill.
The suburb, 16 miles southwest of Chicago’s downtown Loop, lies in the heart of one of the U.S.’s largest Arab communities, where an estimated 25,000 Islamic residents pursue an uneasy assimilation into secular, suburban life. The school’s goal is to give its students such a solid grounding in their religion and education that they will be able to go forth and succeed in mainstream American life without compromising their values. “Proud to be Muslim, proud to be American,” says Safaa Zarzour, vice chairman of the school’s board and its former principal.
In addition i would like to say that on the US government Website they have information about Islamic Schools in North America which i believe some are being paid for by the Government. Obviously we live in a secular society, but we want a balance of deen and education, because they go hand in hand.
Another school which was suppose to open called Khalil Gibran International Academy in brooklyn was shut down because of people like Daniel pipes and many others who said the school was aimed to inculcate the children with radical Islamic ideology.
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Recently I was reading an article about the King of Jordan in the time magazine and found it real cool what he is doing in his country to bring the kind of education he attained in the west to Jordan….
In 1977 he attended the Deerfield Academy in western Massachusetts. His name is Abdullah ibn Hussein, direct descendant of the Prophet Muhammad and scion of the Hashemite dynasty, the onetime princes of Mecca and currently the ruling family of the kingdom of Jordan. Now known as His Majesty King Abdullah II, he points to the years spent as a member of the academy’s class of 1980 as the most formative of his life. Deerfield introduced Abdullah to a much broader range of friends than is normally available to young Arab princes, and the character-building crucible of dormitory life taught him Yankee egalitarianism, self-reliance and how to clear dishes from the dinner table.
But anyhow s now he has built a similar school in Jordan, in 2006 which opened with 100 students but mashallah it’s going great, and has its own rules. The academy set strict rules governing relations between boys and girls: no kissing, no holding hands and no visiting one another’s dorms.
Students at King’s Academy in Madaba, Jordan, October 2007.
So will you send your kids to public schools to improve them and bring the presence of Islam? Will they be ready? and if you decide to send them to Islamic Schools, will they feel like they were dumped there or be comfortable
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