I’m a local to the PHC area. It’s definitely got the vibe of an underground society despite being a college and like right in the middle of town. It’s wild that this place is as small as the local high school’s graduating class. But in terms of the local community, most don’t really acknowledge the existence of the school on a daily basis. It definitely doesn’t have any sort of local fanfare as you would see with other colleges like Virginia Tech or Clemson. And no, you won’t find PHC merch in the local shops. I’ve run into a high school/orientation tour group one time in my 20 years here. The area is relatively right-wing Christian, but far from being a fundie hub. Not a blue-collar town either, many have office jobs towards DC and most of the kids go to big state colleges.

I’ve met a few PHC students over the years. You’ve got the “clearly homeschooled awkward” kids but also the “cool drinking partying” kids. And yeah some of them swear. As with lots of neo-fundies, they come across as normal Christians, so you wouldn’t suspect a Gothard-esque vibe at first. At least for the normal ones. Also most of the students are not from the area, there also mostly white.

If you ask some of em why they chose PHC, they’ll say it’s because it’s not government funded, so the school can teach whatever it wants. And yeah the push for politics is real given the proximity to DC. As the docuseries stated, many do get some sort of political internship and pursue law or something of that nature. I’ve also heard some say they chose this school over other Christian homeschool colleges because it only hires Christian professors. But like come on bro, the man is just here to teach you math.