(The Lion) — As a former public-school teacher of 17 years in South Dakota, Sarah VanDerVliet never thought she would leave to start a hybrid homeschool program.

“If you would have asked me even five years ago, I never, ever would have thought this is what I would be doing,” she says. “But God obviously had different plans for me.”

These plans involve Buffalo Christian Homeschool Academy, described by local media outlets as “a hybrid in-person and at-home K-12 school” with a strong focus on agricultural education. In just three years, her school has grown to 32 students, moved to a bigger location over this Christmas break, and expanded its waitlist.

“God has equipped all of us as parents to know what’s best for our children,” VanDerVliet explains, noting every parent should feel qualified to teach – homeschooling or otherwise.

Indeed, her school’s biblical verse is Romans 12:2: “Do not conform to the patterns of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”

“In the Bible, it talks about generational learning and how grandmas and grandpas would teach, and great-grandmas and grandpas would teach. I think as a society, as a culture, we’ve kind of gotten away from that.”

Hands-on projects nurture independence, self-worth

Some of VanDerVliet’s favorite teaching moments include seeing her students grow with hands-on agricultural projects. These range from raising and processing meat birds to making butter, sour cream and fresh cheese from donated raw milk.

“For us, being home allows us to do more in the farm and work together as a family,” VanDerVliet says, adding her husband’s farming heritage dates to his great-grandparents.

“Because agriculture is so important in everybody’s daily lives, we want students to be smart consumers and be self-sufficient, and understand freedom and their rights,” she said. “I want the next generation to be able to take care of me when I can’t.”

Michelle Stephens, a registered nurse who also serves in the military, credits VanDerVliet with helping her three children integrate academics with existing farm chores.

“With us living on the ranch and my kids in rodeo, taking care of our animals on the farm is really important to us,” she said, adding her 7th-grade son is raising bottle calves.

“There are things that you do with that, as far as profit margin and different stuff. She really helps him with the academic part of that, of really correlating his work to where he could see himself growing in that throughout high school.”

Stephens has also seen tremendous growth in her oldest daughter, who will graduate from Buffalo Christian this spring.

“When she had first started in high school, she was very quiet and very reserved,” she said, explaining her daughter felt she couldn’t express herself fully in the public school she previously attended.

“Rodeo wasn’t a big thing in our small town. She couldn’t really talk about some of the stuff that she wanted. There wasn’t the same interest. When she went to Buffalo Christian, it felt more like a safe place for us to really feel like we were part of something bigger than ourselves, and really kind of just grow with that.”

Such experiences are common among the homeschool program’s older students, especially those coming from public school, according to VanDerVliet.

“Over the three years I’ve had some of those kids, I’ve seen a lot of their mental health change. We’ve seen them be happier, healthier, more confident. I think building their confidence has been huge.”

A moral, Christian framework

VanDerVliet credits much of her students’ improvement in self-worth to a greater awareness in Christian education.

“I’ve seen these students know who they are, have confidence in who they are, knowing that Jesus loves them, and how to use their faith as a light in this world.

“In public school, you couldn’t teach about the Bible. I couldn’t teach a curriculum on it, or that kind of thing. … I really get to dive into it deep now, with the 32 kids that we have.”

Part of VanDerVliet’s motive for establishing Buffalo Christian came from the realization her children were spending more time on schoolwork than spiritual formation.

“We calculated how many hours you spend in school, and then how many hours you actually spend on Sunday school and in youth group,” she said, noting she estimated 30,000 hours for high school vs. 6,000 hours for church activities.

“Is algebra really more important, or is it more important to understand what the Bible means and who Jesus is and what God stands for?”

Through her homeschool journey, VanDerVliet is now able to incorporate her Christian faith “seven days a week, instead of just two days.”

“I’ve seen such a difference in my kids,” she said of spiritual matters, adding it has made a change in academics as well.

“I have seen a change in my daughter, and I’m not saying it’s because I was a teacher – I’m just saying because I think she’s allowed to have the time to complete things at the pace that she can. It took me a whole year and a half, almost two years, just to build her confidence up that yes, you can do math, and yes, you can read.”

VanDerVliet’s daughter, who is now 17, had been on an individualized education program (IEP) in public school. After homeschooling, her daughter has advanced to the point where she can read the 240-page book I Will Protect You: A True Story of Twins Who Survived Auschwitz.

“It just melts my heart that she’s progressing at an achievable level,” VanDerVliet said. “I have noticed her confidence and self-worth has changed so much.”

Stephens also says switching to Buffalo Christian from her children’s previous school was “honestly the best move we could ever have done.”

“We’re kind of bringing back those old-time skills that a lot of these kids have never really been into,” she said, citing activities such as canning, beekeeping, woodworking and leathermaking.

“All of these extra little things that you can do when you’re a smaller group allows them to work together and do things as a group, and it’s been really fun to see how they’ve grown and created something pretty amazing.”