New Christian school in central Newfoundland teaching alternate curriculum based on Bible

It's always busy at Rachel Mullett's house in Gander. With four children under age five, play time is all the time.

The dynamic will change in September, though, when five-year-old Hudson goes off to kindergarten. He'll be one of the first students at the brand-new Crossroads Academy.

"I'm looking forward to knowing what my book looks like and my pencil. I most like doing everything. Everything's just so exciting," he said.

His new school is based at the local Pentecostal church, but it doesn't follow the same curriculum as the province's public schools. 

It uses an education program called Abeka, which comes from the United States and teaches based on a literal interpretation of the Bible. 

That means the school's students are taught the earth is 6,000 years old, it was created by God in six days and humans lived at the same time as dinosaurs.

"The Abeka science and health program presents the universe as the direct, orderly, law-abiding creation of God and refutes the man-made idea of evolution," states the program's website. "Students are presented with plants, animals, rocks, elements, forces, the human body — and much more — according to an understanding of the design and laws of nature."

The health program takes its teachings on homosexuality and adultery literally from the Bible as well.

"Dr. Hugh Pyle discusses adultery, fornication, and homosexuality as they are presented in the Bible and explains their results," says a summary of Abeka's sexual education textbook Sex, Love, and Romance: Sex education from the Bible. "The book also details God's plan concerning purity and marriage and the consequences of disobeying his moral commands in these areas."

 Angela Hodder, one of the founders of the Crossroads Academy, says it has proven to be a curriculum that's entirely biblical based.

"Even the math. If you look at the math book, it ties in biblical concepts. It teaches the children all the concepts they need to know, but it ties in that Christian part of it. The biblical aspect of it," said  Hodder.

She said they want parents to have "another option."

"People don't always want to maybe send their children to a public school," she said. "With the class sizes and different other things."

So far, only six students are registered for the coming year, but the new school is accepting kids from kindergarten to Grade 6. Tuition is $5,400 per year, and the organizers are hoping to expand the school to include students up to high school.

But it's not clear what that would mean for the students at Crossroads. 

The provincial government says all schools must meet the same educational standards in order for students to graduate. If they don't, they won't receive an official diploma. The Education Department specifies that students who complete Grades 10 to 12 under the Abeka system won't qualify.

For Mullett — who was raised in Ontario's Christian schools — both the curriculum and the cost of sending four kids to the school makes sense.

"I don't think that science and faith conflict each other at all," she said. "Everyone sees the world through a lens and so the way we see the world is through a Christian lens. And I think science and God can actually complement each other very well. So we will be teaching science while looking for God throughout everything we're teaching them in the scientific field."

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