Sharp Arrows

Lawsuit: PA School District Using School-Issued Laptop Webcams to Spy on Students

2010-02-18T08:01:00.000-08:00

With the development of new techonologies, some of which have capabilities that we do not even realize, we put our privacy at risk. There has also been a big push to provide children with laptop computers for school work. Well, along with these "carrots", there may be a few "sticks". Also, you can be certain that if a capability to invade someone's privacy is made available, there will be those who take advantage of it. What's troubling is when those with that capability have the power to use that information to harm you.

Posted at America's Right:

A class action lawsuit filed late yesterday in Federal Court in Philadelphia has shed light on a secret surveillance program targeting Americans, but this particular operation is not being run by the FBI or the NSA. It’s being run by the Lower Merion School District, in the old-money Main Line suburbs of Philadelphia, PA.

The complaint, filed by minor high school student Blake Robbins and his parents, alleges that the school district has been spying on the activities of students and students’ families through the “indiscriminant use of and ability to remotely activate the webcams incorporated into each laptop issued to students,” all without the knowledge or consent of any of the students or parents involved.

Through a one-to-one laptop computer initiative funded by state and federal grants, each of the approximately 1,800 students in the school district’s two high schools, Harriton High School in Rosemont, PA and Lower Merion High School in Ardmore, PA were issued a webcam-equipped personal laptop computer. The initiative, according to remarks by Superintendent—and defendant—Christopher McGinley on the district’s Web site, “enhances opportunities for ongoing collaboration, and ensures that all students have 24/7 access to school based resources and the ability to seamlessly work on projects and research at school and at home.”

What students and parents did not know, however, was that the 24/7 access goes both ways. According to the complaint, nowhere in any of the documentation accompanying the laptops or otherwise disseminated to students and parents was any reference made to the ability of the school district to remotely activate the webcam embedded in each laptop at any time, according to the district’s discretion.

How the capability was discovered should be enough to put any who value civil liberties and privacy on the edge of their seat. From the complaint (emphasis mine):

On November 11, 2009, Plaintiffs were for the first time informed of the above-mentioned capability and practice by the School District when Lindy Matsko, an Assistant Principal at Harriton High School, informed minor Plaintiff that the School District was of the belief that minor Plaintiff was engaged in improper behavior in his home, and cited as evidence a photograph from the webcam embedded in minor Plaintiff’s personal laptop issued by the School District.

It was only then that Blake Robbins’ father, Michael, verified from Assistant Principal Lindy Matsko that the school district did in fact have the capability of remotely activating the cameras embedded in the district-issued laptop computer wherever the computer may be situated and regardless of whether the student is using it, and that the school district could at any time choose “to view and capture whatever images were in front of the webcam, all without the knowledge, permission or authorization of any persons then and there using the laptop computer.”

The school district’s conduct, the plaintiffs allege, runs afoul of not only the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution, but also a laundry list of federal and state laws intended to protect the privacy of people and stored information alike. This includes the Electronic Communication Privacy Act, the Computer Fraud Abuse Act, the Stored Communications Act, §1983 of the Civil Rights Act, the Pennsylvania Wiretapping and Electronic Surveillance Act, and Pennsylvania common law as well.

In the complaint, the plaintiffs voice concerns as to any students or family members who could have been caught in “embarrassing and humiliating” situations, noting that “the laptops at issue were routinely used by students and family members while at home,” and that “many of the images captured and intercepted may consist of images of minors and their parents or friends in compromising or embarrassing positions, including, but not limited to, in various stage of dress or undress.”

Blake Robbins and his parents are represented by Mark Haltzman of Lamm Rubenstone LLC. Class members include any students who have been issued webcam-equipped personal laptop computers by the Lower Merion School District. The plainiffs are seeking punitive and other damages stemming from the school district’s invasion of privacy.

Robbins v. Lower Merion School District, case number 2:10cv00665, was filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on Tuesday, February 16, 2010. Click HERE for a PDF copy of the complaint.

Abstinence Education Works

2010-02-03T15:03:00.000-08:00

A message sponsered by "Captain Obvious":

Posted at CitizenLink

Abstinence education is effective in reducing sexual activity among youth, according to a study published in the February 2010 Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine conducted by University of Pennsylvania researchers.

The students in the abstinence class initiated less sex, had fewer sexual partners and had more pronounced risk reductions compared to those receiving safe-sex and comprehensive sex education.

Leslee Unruh, president and founder of National Abstinence Clearinghouse, said abstinence programs showed "kids there are too many great things riding on their future to risk it to STDs, pregnancy and broken hearts."

"Finally, a study that proves what those of us who have been teaching abstinence have known for years," she said, "these programs help develop self-control and self-esteem, teaching kids they do not need to fall prey to the game of Russian Roulette with condoms."

More than 600 high-risk African-American students, in grades 6-7, took part in a study that confirms what pro-life leaders have said for years.

Dr. David Stevens, CEO of the 16,000 member Christian Medical Association, said science has finally caught up with logic.

"Parents have known for centuries," he said, "by empirically demonstrating that equipping teens to abstain from sexual activity is an effective way to prevent teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases."

FOR MORE INFORMATION
View the study.

High schools confiscate plastic fetuses

2010-02-01T16:46:00.000-08:00

Posted at Roswell, N.M. KRQE News 13:

Roswell School District officials confiscated hundreds of plastic fetuses Friday that about 50 students distributed at four Roswell area high schools.

The students are members of Relentless, a religious group that is campaigning to put religion back into school programs.

Roswell High School student Stephanie Collier says 3,500 two-inch fetuses were distributed at Roswell, Goddard, Dexter and Valley Christian Academy high schools as a message that all life is important.

Roswell Independent School District superintendent Michael Gottlieb says the fetuses were taken away because they hadn't been approved by the instructional office.

And here is a picture of the offending contraband.

So am I to understand that everything that is handed out in schools is "approved by the instructional office"?

Perhaps the school doesn't want to promote a belief in fetuses.

State rules in favor of young transgender

2010-01-27T10:45:00.000-08:00

Posted at the Bangor Daily News:

AUGUSTA, Maine — The Maine Human Rights Commission ruled Monday that the Orono School Department discriminated against a transgender child by denying her access to the girls bathroom.

While the school department’s lawyer warned that schools around the state may not be ready to manage the practical fallout from the decision, civil liberties advocates hailed the ruling as an advancement of human rights.

“This ruling is a huge step forward for a vulnerable population that is entitled to the full protection of the law,” said Zachary Heiden, legal director of the Maine Civil Liberties Union. “There will always be voices who claim we’re not ready, we’re not there yet, the time to end discrimination is next year, or next session. But victims of discrimination should not have to wait.”

The attorney for the child and her parents said his clients are very happy with the outcome of their complaint.

“At the very heart of it is the issue of basic human dignity and fundamental civil liberties,” said Eric Mehnert. “It was a good decision.”

But Melissa Hewey, attorney for the Orono School Department, said the ruling was “a huge leap.”

“I’m not sure that it takes into account practicalities that face educators around the state,” she said. “You can understand [the ruling] intellectually. You can agree with it intellectually. But practice is sometimes different — and I think that’s what may have escaped some people in this case.”

The discrimination in question first occurred in October 2007 when the child was in the fifth grade at Asa Adams School. Until then, she was allowed to use the girls’ bathroom, although she was biologically male. But that fall, the transgender child was followed into the girls room by a male student who had “previously started to harass her by stalking her and calling her ‘faggot,’” according to the Maine Human Rights Commission investigator’s report.

After the second such episode, the boy was suspended and removed from the transgender child’s class. At that point, school officials told the transgender child that she had to use a single-stall faculty bathroom at the other end of the school, and that was when her parents decided to take the matter to the Maine Human Rights Commission.

You can't make a "he" a "she" by changing his clothes and calling him "her" any more than I can put on a jumpsuit and say I'm Elvis Presley and start living at Graceland.

Trustee's speech to kids turns into sex talk

2010-01-26T07:46:00.000-08:00

This story is from the Galveston County Daily News in Texas:

What was supposed to be a motivation speech to a collection of sixth- through eighth-grade girls at Crosby Middle School instead turned into an explicit sex talk, including descriptions on how to perform oral and anal sex, Hitchcock school officials said.

The motivational speaker turned out to be a Hitchcock school board member, Shirley Price.

Hitchcock Superintendent Mike Bergman said the Jan. 15 pep talk was supposed to be a motivational speech.

Price, who was born with physical handicaps, still managed to earn a doctoral degree and also won a seat on the school board.

Bergman said when Price was introduced, she asked that the school’s principal leave the room. Most of the teachers remained, but they did not step in when Price’s speech turned inappropriate, Bergman said.

“Somehow she got some story that she heard that students were having sex on campus and went into a speech about sexual type things,” Bergman said. “There was no motivational speech at all.”

The speech reportedly turned graphic and included instructions on how to perform oral and anal sex and included several curse words, Bergman said.

Students apparently were told to keep the contents of the speech secret, Bergman said.

NO SECRETS!!!!! If there is anything our children need to tell us parents about, it's anything that another adult has told them in "secret".

I can't believe that teachers just stood by and let this pervert just yammer on and on with this subject matter. You cannont "unhear" what you've heard, nor "unsee" what you have seen. These children are affected forever by what this pervert has told them and her mission is accomplished. Yours, as parents, has been largely thwarted.

This kind of thing would be grounds for investigation and arrest if it had happened at a birthday party or sleep over. Why do we let the schools get away with this?

God help us all.

Mother sues schools over unauthorized gynecological exam

2010-01-25T07:30:00.000-08:00

This article is an excellent reminder that we tell our children not to consent to any kind of examination or questioning that they are not comfortable with. Right away a child should request that their parents be contacted. I tell my children that no matter what is threatened, they will not be in any trouble for insisting that their mother of father be called and brought in prior to any questioning, searching, or examination. No job or school is worth that much.

Posted at the Nashville City Paper:

An Antioch woman is suing the Metro Board of Education and a former nurse at Mt. View Elementary, claiming the nurse performed a gynecological exam on her daughter without her consent.

Seeking unspecified damages, the woman claims the exam inflicted emotional distress on her daughter, resulting in post-traumatic stress disorder.

According to documents filed in Davidson County Circuit Court on Wednesday, the 6-year-old girl had a history of bladder and urinary tract infections. On Oct. 28, the girl complained to her teacher of genital pain, the filing says. Her mother confirmed to the teacher that the girl had a doctor appointment in a couple of days. The following day the girl was taken out of art class and brought before the school nurse, who no longer works at Mt. View Elementary. The nurse asked the girl, the filing says, "if anyone had touched her privates." The girl said, "No."

"[The nurse] then took [the girl] to the bathroom and had her pull down her pants and panties and squat. She then told [the girl] to open her private. [The nurse] then told her, 'it's not red, you can pull your pants up.'"

Prior to filing the suit, the woman's attorney, Phillip L. Davidson, said the school board had been unresponsive. "The school board has not cooperated with us at all in trying to investigate this matter."

A spokeswoman for the school board declined to comment.

Preacher's toe touches school lawn, he gets arrested

2010-01-22T07:04:00.000-08:00

Why do people seem to think that "Freedom of Religion" is the same thing as "Freedom from Religion"? Often times the state thinks that their duty to "make no law respecting an establishment of religion" means the same thing as "protecting" children from hearing anything religious. They're completely ignoring the part that says prohibits making a law to prohibit the free exercise of religion.

Posted at World Net Daily:

A New Jersey judge has dismissed a criminal case against a volunteer who was preaching the Gospel on public property in front of the Edison, N.J., High School when his toe inadvertently brushed the grass and he was arrested.

The case has been detailed by the Alliance Defense Fund, which takes on civil rights and religious rights cases nationwide.

The order dismissing the case against Robert Parker was signed by Judge Travis Francis.

"Christians shouldn't be arrested and charged as criminals for expressing their beliefs on public property. They have the same First Amendment rights as anyone else in America," said ADF-allied attorney Demetrios Stratis of Fair Lawn.

"A person cannot be charged with a crime just because a school official has a complete misunderstanding of the First Amendment or doesn't like what that person has to say. We are pleased that we prevailed in court in getting these unwarranted criminal charges dropped," he said.

According to the report issued yesterday by the ADF, Parker "was taken into custody after his toe touched the grass on the school's side of the sidewalk. He was charged with trespass and disorderly conduct."

It was last May when Parker was sharing the Gospel from a public sidewalk outside the high school after students were dismissed for the day.

The school principal came out and told him to leave, whereupon Parker explained his First Amendment free speech and free exercise of religion protections. Dissatisfied, the principal called police.

According to the ADF, when officers arrived they took control of the situation and instructed students "not to go near Parker."

The principal then insisted that Parker be arrested.

"While speaking with officers, Parker's toe brushed against the grass along the school side of the sidewalk. The officers arrested him and issued him a summons for 'defiant trespassing,'" the ADF reported.

The events leading to the arrest were recorded on video.

Stratis later filed a motion to dismiss the charges with the Superior Court of New Jersey, Middlesex County, and the court ordered the dismissal. The Edison Municipal Court later followed the order.

'Sexting': Child Pornography or Free-Speech Right?

2010-01-15T10:55:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com:

PHILADELPHIA — A federal appeals court must decide whether "sexting" by three Pennsylvania teens amounts to child pornography or is a free-speech right.

A three-judge panel in Philadelphia is hearing arguments Friday in a case between a county prosecutor and the American Civil Liberties Union.

The prosecutor is threatening to file child-pornography charges against three girls after racy cell-phone images of them circulated through their high school.

I don't see "none of the above" as an option. Although I don't consider these children as "child pornographers", nor do I consider it a "free-speech right". What these girls, as well as thousands of children across America and around the world, have done is wrong. They should be punished as well as anyone found to have forwarded these pictures along to anyone else. As to whether these kids are actually sexual predators is debatable. Some may be, most are probably not.

Perhaps there should be a fine assessed along with a revocation of the cell phones. I'm not an advocate of creating new laws everytime something pops up, but if our only choices are to label these kids as "sex offender" or to let them off the hook, we need to consider a third option.

Wilson schools agree to end Bible distribution to students at school after student complaint - WHNT

2010-01-06T08:11:00.000-08:00

Posted today at WHNT Channel 9 in Huntsville, AL. This story actually comes from Tennessee.

LEBANON, Tenn. (AP) — Wilson County schools have agreed to end the distribution of Bibles to students during the school day and on school grounds.

The settlement came after the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee threatened to sue on behalf of a fifth-grade student at Carroll-Oakland Elementary School. A Tuesday news release announcing the settlement claims the student took a Bible during a distribution in the school's gym because she feared being ostracized if she did not.

In the settlement, school board members acknowledge that distribution of Bibles to students at school has been recognized as a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

The "Establishment Clause" of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads as follows:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...

Siimply getting school board members to "acknowledge that distribution of Bibles to students at school has been recognized as a violation of the Establishment Clause" doesn't necessarily make it true.

The same founders who wrote and ratified the U.S. Constitution didn't have a problem with the Bible being used in public schools.

Benjamin Rush: A Defense of the Use of the Bible in Public Schools

Benjamin Franklin: insisted that schools teach "the excellency of the Christian religion above all others, ancient or modern.

James Madison: In 1812, President Madison signed a federal bill which economically aided the Bible Society of Philadelphia in its goal of the mass distribution of the Bible.
“ An Act for the relief of the Bible Society of Philadelphia” Approved February 2, 1813 by Congress

Is there any chance that those who now believe that it violates the Establishment Clause to distribute bibles could be mistaken?

Defense launched for kids sex books

2009-12-23T11:28:00.000-08:00

Posted at WorldNetDaily:

The chairman of the American Library Association's Intellectual Freedom Committee has launched a defense of Kevin Jennings and the sexually explicit books recommended for children by the homosexual advocacy organization that Jennings started, the Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network.

"Though Jennings' and GLSEN's critics claim to be upholding American morals and values by condemning the GLSEN book list, they are actually undermining the values of tolerance, free inquiry, and self-determination that inform and sustain our democratic way of life in the United States," said Martin Garnar in a statement.

"Stigmatizing particular ideas and engaging in unfounded personal attacks in an effort to censor and suppress opposing opinions and ideas is the antithesis of intellectual freedom, especially when done to discourage and prevent individuals from accessing or considering those opinions and ideas," he wrote.

I'm sure this library association is also busy defending this girl's personal reading selection.

New Jersey Teacher Orders 3rd Grader to Put Away Bible During Quiet Time

2009-12-21T06:51:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com:

A third grader was told by a teacher at her New Jersey elementary school that the Bible was not appropriate reading material for quiet time, MyFoxNY.com reported.

The teacher at Madison Park Elementary School in Old Bridge, N.J., ordered the girl, Mariah, to put away her Bible.

Michelle Jordat, Mariah’s mother, said her daughter was upset and confused by the incident, MyFoxNY.com reported.

"This was injustice," Jordat said, according to MyFoxNY.com.

"No other child has to go through this again."

The school’s principal apologized for the incident, saying school policy does in fact allow students to read the Bible during quiet time and that the teacher had simply made a mistake, MyFoxNY.com reported.

I spend a great deal of time teaching my children that they had better make sure they know what they are talking about when they tell their younger siblings that they can or cannot do something because of how it may affect them. Someone needs to tell this teach that if they don't know what they're talking about, then they need to shut their mouth.

Obama's Safe Schools Czar Tied to Lewd Readings for 7th Graders

2009-12-18T08:23:00.000-08:00

Now FOXNews.com is picking up this story. Thank God.

MPS approves condom giveaways

2009-12-18T08:04:00.000-08:00

Posted today at JSOnline, it appears that there is absolutely NO opposition to the Milwaukee public school system handing out condoms to children.

Without discussion, the Milwaukee School Board voted 7-0 Thursday night to make condoms available at many of the city's high schools, paving the way to make Milwaukee Public Schools one of the relatively few districts in the nation to provide contraception to students.

The communicable disease prevention program, as the district calls it, could be in place as soon as the 2010-'11 school year.

The proposal sparked some opposition after being made public Dec. 2, but the board approved the condom distribution without much dissent. Comments from the public are not allowed at board meetings and a board committee had voted 5-0 on Dec. 9 to recommend adopting the program.

The condoms will be available free of charge, but only to students in high schools that have school nurses and only after students request them at the nurse's office, according to a fact sheet circulated by the school district. Up to two condoms will be distributed at a time.

Handing children condoms because they're having sex anyway is like teaching kids how to aviod getting caught shoplifting since they're going to do it anyway. It's aimed at trying to reduce the impact of the consequences rather than preventing the bad behavior in the first place. One of the major deterrents to immoral behavior besides one's on conscience is the risk of the consequences. Risk is based on two things; severity and likelihood of occurence. Condoms are intended to mitigate the consequences by reducing the likelihood of occurence. They can't do anything about the severity of an STD or teen prenancy. Also, what mitigating the consequences does is make it easier to defy what your own conscience is trying to tell you is wrong. It is equivalent to reducing the enforcement of crime in order to reduce the number of people in jails.

New York School Gives Christmas the Cold Shoulder

2009-12-11T09:03:00.000-08:00

Posted at Liberty Counsel:

East Syracuse, NY – In the Minoa School District, parents received a letter from their school with strict limits that essentially ban all things Christmas from the school’s program. The letter reads, “Programs that involve singular traditions may take place but such celebrations must be voluntary, occur outside of regular hours, and not be sponsored by the school district.”

Patti Puma, a parent with four children in the school district, approached Deputy Superintendent Dr. Thomas Neveldine about this new restriction. Dr. Neveldine told her that Santa Claus was no longer allowed on campus because he originated from the story about St. Nicholas. Thus, according to the Deputy Superintendent, nothing with any hint of Christianity is permissible to celebrate Christmas, even if the symbol has a decidedly secular meaning today.

On Monday, concerned parents and citizens will address the local school board. A growing group of parents are fighting against these ridiculous restrictions. A petition has been started that requests the return of Christmas celebrations. Dr. Neveldine can be reached by calling 315-434-3006.

Someone should inform this school that CHRISTMAS is a Federal holiday according to Federal law (5 U.S.C. 6103).

Safe schools chief touts child porn for classrooms

2009-12-07T07:07:00.000-08:00

My previous post from Gateway Pundit has gotten the attention of a more mainstream education news website, EducationNews.org. I include a listing of their headlines in my left sidebar. The article also references an article by WorldNetDaily regarding Kevin Jennings.

I intend to find out if any of these books are on file in my local school libraries, and work to have them removed. I also intend to work to see to it that Mr. Jennings is removed from his position as the head of the U.S. Office of Safe Schools for the Obama administration.

I can't imagine for a moment that the president was so unaware of this man's history that he should be surprised by this. This must be a deliberate act to mainstream this type of filth into the nations education system and to destroy the moral fabric of this country as fast as humanly, possible.

Breaking: Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar” Is Promoting Child Porn in the Classroom– Kevin Jennings and the GLSEN Reading List

2009-12-04T11:48:00.000-08:00

Posted on Gateway Pundit, this information alone should be more than enough to cause a mass exodus for the door from public schooling regardless of your religious beliefs. Anyone who knows ANYTHING about raising children and what is appropriate and not appropriate for children to be reading should be utterly appalled.

Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings was the founder, and for many years, Executive Director of an organization called the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN). GLSEN started essentially as Jennings’ personal project and grew to become the culmination of his life’s work. And he was chosen by President Obama to be the nation’s Safe Schools Czar primarily because he had founded and led GLSEN (scroll for bio).

GLSEN’s stated mission is to empower gay youth in the schools and to stop harassment by other students. It encourages the formation of Gay Student Alliances and condemns the use of hateful words. GLSEN also strives to influence the educational curriculum to include materials which the group believes will increase tolerance of gay students and decrease bullying. To that end, GLSEN maintains a recommended reading list of books that it claims “furthers our mission to ensure safe schools for all students.” In other words, these are the books that GLSEN’s directors think all kids should be reading: gay kids should read them to raise their self-esteem, and straight kids should read them in order to become more aware and tolerant and stop bullying gay kids. Through GLSEN’s online ordering system, called “GLSEN BookLink,” featured prominently on their Web site, teachers can buy the books to use as required classroom assignments, or students can buy them to read on their own.

According to GLSEN’s own press releases from the period during which its recommended reading list was developed, the organization’s three areas of focus were creating “educational resources, public policy agenda, [and] student organizing programs”; in other words, the reading list (chief among its “educational resources”) was of prime importance in GLSEN’s efforts to influence the American educational system.

The list is divided into three main categories: books recommended for grades K-6; books recommended for grades 7-12; and books for teachers. (The books on the list span all genres: fiction, nonfiction, memoirs, even poetry.)

Out of curiosity to see exactly what kind of books Kevin Jennings and his organization think American students should be reading in school, our team chose a handful at random from the over 100 titles on GLSEN’s grades 7-12 list, and began reading through.

What we discovered shocked us. We were flabbergasted. Rendered speechless.

We were unprepared for what we encountered. Book after book after book contained stories and anecdotes that weren’t merely X-rated and pornographic, but which featured explicit descriptions of sex acts between pre-schoolers; stories that seemed to promote and recommend child-adult sexual relationships; stories of public masturbation, anal sex in restrooms, affairs between students and teachers, five-year-olds playing sex games, semen flying through the air. One memoir even praised becoming a prostitute as a way to increase one’s self-esteem. Above all, the books seemed to have less to do with promoting tolerance than with an unabashed attempt to indoctrinate students into a hyper-sexualized worldview.

I'm not going to post the entire article here because of the incredibly harsh graphical nature of the language that is in the book excerpts. I'm not even going to read most of them myself. I must say that I am disgusted at the thought of any school children reading this.

If your curious, follow the link. However, be warned that the content is extremely sexually graphic in nature.

Parents Take a Beating from School District, Court in Anti-Bullying Case

2009-12-03T15:30:00.000-08:00

Posted at Pacific Justice Institute.

A judge today slammed parents as “bigots” for seeking to excuse their elementary-age children from controversial pro-homosexual curriculum. The parents are being represented in court by Pacific Justice Institute.

PJI Chief Counsel Kevin Snider argued in Alameda Superior Court today on behalf of parents seeking to enforce a provision of the California Education Code that gives parents the right to opt their kids out of health education. Alameda Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch lambasted the parents, repeatedly insinuating that they are bigots and insisting there can be no homosexual indoctrination because people are born that way. The judge equated a view contrary to his own with creationism and called both false.

The legal battle over Alameda’s anti-bullying curriculum has intensified in recent weeks. Leading up to today’s hearing, attorneys for the school district grilled parents in depositions about their religious beliefs. Parents were asked numerous questions about church attendance, sermons they had heard against homosexuality, and whether they were aware that the Bible had been used to defend racism and oppression.

PJI Chief Counsel Kevin Snider commented on today’s hearing, “We believe that this ruling against parents is inconsistent with the Education Code, and we are looking forward to continuing this battle until opt-out rights are restored on appeal, or the curriculum is changed.” Snider emphasized that the parents who filed suit support comprehensive anti-bullying instruction; however, they oppose the current elementary curriculum that focuses almost exclusively on homosexuality. School records released by Alameda Unified School District show that bullying based on race and gender is far more prevalent in AUSD than sexual orientation harassment.

PJI President Brad Dacus stated, “Most parents do not want their first through fifth graders bombarded with pro-homosexual messages at school. If LGBT advocates really want to stop name-calling and bullying, they should start with themselves.”

These people clearly do not have your child's best interests in mind.

California Junior High Principal Apologizes For Not Warning Parents About Pro-Homosexual Program for 8th Graders

2009-12-03T12:36:00.000-08:00

Afterall, it's easier to ask for forgiveness than for permission...

Posted at CNSNews.com:

The principal and a teacher at Goleta Valley Junior High School in Santa Barbara County, California are apologizing to parents for not following school district policy relating to a pro-homosexual workshop given to 8th grade students in a leadership class at the school.

The controversial workshop was presented by “Just Communities Central Coast” in three, 45-minute sessions over three days. It included handouts defining homosexual terminology, including queer and transgender, and listed “heterosexism” as “oppression that ‘pushes down’ people who are LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender and questioning) and ‘pushes up’ people who are straight.”

The handout defines sexual orientation this way: “Refers to who we feel romantically and sexually attracted to and who we fall in love with.”

One page featuring cartoon-like figures and entitled “Gender & Sexuality Definitions: A Visual Map,” depicts a person's body with the heart area labeled as “sexual orientation” and the genital area labeled as “sex.”

A page entitled “Heterosexism” asks students to answer a three-part question: “How are LGBTQ people discriminated against or mistreated in the United States, in your local community and in your school?”

You can't tell me that this was accidentally overlooked by the school. This was intentionally covered up. First, it seems that the principal looks for a "loop hole" as to why it was not presented to parents as an "opt out" opportunity.

Cleary told Rogers. “She said because [the workshop] falls under a health heading, they don’t need to do an ‘opt out.’ But if it had gone under a sex education heading, they could have an ‘opt out.’

I say bull. What does their sex education normally fall under if it's not a health heading?

You can expect more of this in the future and you can expect it at your schools if something is not done about it now.

MPS to discuss providing condoms to students

2009-12-03T07:38:00.000-08:00

Posted on the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel today.

Milwaukee Public Schools' health officials want to make condoms freely available to students in many of the district's high schools, as part of an effort to combat the health risks that sexually transmitted infections and other communicable diseases pose to young people.

If the proposal wins the support of the School Board, the new policy could take effect as early as next school year, making MPS one of a few districts in the nation that provide contraception to students.

Kathleen Murphy, the district's health coordinator, said that data continues to show that middle and high school students are engaging in sex frequently and at younger ages, and that youth - especially those of color - are disproportionately affected when it comes to sexually transmitted infections.

"These are life-threatening illnesses for young people, and they're already reporting to us that they're having sex," said Murphy. "The question is, do we have the ability to help delay and deter the lifelong health consequences of the conduct that they're already doing?"

They're trying to mitigate the consequences of the wrong behavior. The consequences are "sexually transmitted infections and other communicable diseases". They are assuming that these consequences are due to the "bad behavior" of not using condoms. However, condoms don't prevent all STDs, and improper condom use does almost nothing at all.

The true "bad behavior" that result in these consequences is the promiscuity of these teenagers, which is considered acceptable and natrual by many of the people who are supposed to know better.

There is also one other fatal flaw in their plan.

Terry Falk, vice chairman of the committee, said the proposal is not about "handing out condoms like candy."

"What we're hoping for is that students who come in for these will walk away with a larger discussion about their sexual activity and, in some cases, we may find out where there are problems in their lives over and above the use of condoms," Falk said.

"We're hoping that the end result will be less sexual activity rather than more if this is done right."

Know that they will be in for a "talk" with school counselors when they go to get their condoms will likely deter them from showing up in the first place. The real end result will be business as usual.

Think Your Kid Is Not 'Sexting'? Think Again

2009-12-03T07:29:00.000-08:00

Posted today on FOXNews.com

Sexting — sharing sexually explicit photos, videos and chat by cell phone or online — is fairly commonplace among young people, despite sometimes grim consequences for those who do it. More than a quarter of young people have been involved in sexting in some form, an Associated Press-MTV poll found.

That includes Sammy, a 16-year-old from the Bay Area who asked that his last name not be used.

Sammy said he had shared naked pictures of himself with girlfriends. He also shared naked pictures of someone else that a friend had sent him.

What he didn't realize at the time was that young people across the country — in Florida, Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania — have faced charges, in some cases felony charges, for sending nude pictures.

"That's why I probably wouldn't do it again," Sammy said.

Yet, "I just don't see it as that big of a problem, personally."

That was the view of nearly half of those surveyed who have been involved in sexting. The other half said it's a serious problem — and did it anyway. Knowing there might be consequences hasn't stopped them.

That's because our socieity, through TV, movies, music, and even teaching in our tax-funded schools promote promiscuity and an unhealthy view of sexuality. The biggest problem here is that these kids don't think that there is anything wrong with it. They think that the only consequences are possibly getting in trouble should they get caught, but they don't even know how much trouble they could be in.

However, most of their problems may not be legal. These kids share these pictures with other kids, they wind up on the internet, and then they can wind up anywhere.

Those who sent nude pictures of themselves mostly said they went to a boyfriend, girlfriend or romantic interest.

But 14 percent said they suspect the pictures were shared without permission, and they may be right: Seventeen percent of those who received naked pictures said they passed them along to someone else, often to more than just one person.

Boys were a little more likely than girls to say they received naked pictures or video of someone that had been passed around without the person's consent. Common reasons were that they thought other people would want to see, that they were showing off and that they were bored.

Girls were a little more likely to send pictures of themselves. Yet boys were more likely to say that sexting is "hot," while most girls called it "slutty."

That's because boys think that "slutty" is "hot". They also like to brag to other boys about their accomplishments. However, most boys will never seriously date or even marry a "slut".

Katherine Kersten: At U, future teachers may be reeducated

2009-11-24T08:47:00.000-08:00

Posted at the Star Tribune.

Do you believe in the American dream -- the idea that in this country, hardworking people of every race, color and creed can get ahead on their own merits? If so, that belief may soon bar you from getting a license to teach in Minnesota public schools -- at least if you plan to get your teaching degree at the University of Minnesota's Twin Cities campus.

In a report compiled last summer, the Race, Culture, Class and Gender Task Group at the U's College of Education and Human Development recommended that aspiring teachers there must repudiate the notion of "the American Dream" in order to obtain the recommendation for licensure required by the Minnesota Board of Teaching. Instead, teacher candidates must embrace -- and be prepared to teach our state's kids -- the task force's own vision of America as an oppressive hellhole: racist, sexist and homophobic.

Here is the report: Race, Culture, Class, and Gender Task Group

Why does skin color always have to be made an issue? Why to the exclusion of other natural traits such as height, eye color, hair color, type of hair, head shape, etc.? The people who write these kind of reports must think that people with skin color other than that which is classified as "white" are intellectually inferior and need their help. They also seem to think that white people need to be punished for... well, I guess for being white.

Is this the kind of future that we have to look forward to from teachers in the government school system? Doesn't the fact that this country legitamately elected an interracial American to the office of President of the United States dispell this report as hogwash?

Do black kids really believe that "All black men go to prison"? Are Buddhist Korean parents really horrified to see their child's name in red ink? Or, are these clowns simply painting with a broad brush in much the same way as racists who believe that whites are indeed superior to other races? Can anyone enlighten me on this?

Girl May Have Arranged Classmate's Gang Rape

2009-11-24T07:56:00.000-08:00

Posted on Fox News today, Girl May Have Arranged Classmate's Gang Rape.

MONROEVILLE, Ala. — A 14-year-old Alabama girl might have helped arrange the gang rape of her ninth-grade classmate and could face charges as an accomplice based on her comments in a televised interview, a district attorney said.

The girl told reporters last week that she and her 14-year-old classmate had planned to have sex with the suspects who have been charged with rape. The girl under investigation is dating one of the three suspects who are 16, 17 and 20 years old.

"The victim told police that the attack did begin as consensual contact," Monroe County District Attorney Tommy Chapman told the Press-Register of Mobile for a Monday story. "But when all three suspects began to join in, she told them no repeatedly, but they did not stop."

Authorities said the girl required surgery after the Nov. 16 attack and was in intensive care for three days.

Why would a 14-year-old girl think so little of having group sex with men as old as 20 that they are willing to state on a TV interview that it was planned? The culture today on TV, in music, and yes, even in SCHOOLS is so sexualized that children are overexposed to it all and begin to think that this kind of behavior is "normal". When is America going to wake up to the destructive forces that are being leveled against our children?

The worst part of the story comes farther down.

The men then took the classmates back to school where the injured girl sat in bloody clothes for hours until school officials called police, investigators said.

This is heartbreaking. This is just a little girl. Why did it take school officials "hours" to call the police?

Karen Hollander sues Department of Education for slipping on condoms outside high school

2009-11-23T09:19:00.000-08:00

Karen Hollander sues Department of Education for slipping on condoms outside high school: "The suit says school officials failed to maintain safety in the cafeteria by allowing trash that included condoms to pile up on the floor."

The idea of condoms laying all over the floor in a highschool cafeteria should discust american parents.

Former teacher's aide charged with sexually assaulting a child

2009-11-20T13:22:00.000-08:00

Even in small-town Wisconsin, Former teacher's aide charged with sexually assaulting a child.

Schools let students seek secret abortions

2009-11-20T09:12:00.000-08:00

Posted at World Net Daily: Schools let students seek secret abortions.

The reason that this can happen is because there have been occasions where it has happened and schools are making sure that they are covered for it. How often does this go on? The state is taking measures to gain the confidence and control of your children by acting as their friend to try and protect them from you, regardless of whether or not protection is warranted. In most cases, it means protecting the child from a parent who disagrees with the immoral decision to kill a baby.

So, if the state school, in conjuction with your minor child, think that its OK to kill an unborn baby, and you happen to disagree, they'll go ahead and do it without you. Hey, it's legal isn't it? It's right there in black-and-white. If it's legal, it must be OK and if you disagree, you must be wrong. If you're unwilling to change your position, you must also be unreasonable and close-minded.

I can hardly think of a more troubling situation than to have a school or clinic give me a call to inform me that there has been a problem in the course of administering a routine abortion to my 13-year-old daughter and I need to come down right away.

God, help any parent who gets a call like that.

New Jersey Teen Barred From Abortion Protest Sues School

2009-11-17T15:17:00.000-08:00

Here's another story from Fox News. This one is regarding a student who was told that she couldn't participate in an abortion protest because it was "religious": New Jersey Teen Barred From Abortion Protest Sues School.

I don't get it. Why are schools so afraid of students expressing themselves in a religious manner, but are OK with them expressing themselves in just about any other way?

The principal said:

The armband would have violated the school's strict dress code, he said. He said it allows "no insignias unless it has to do with Bridgeton High School."

And he said the school has a policy that generally doesn't allow students or staff to distribute literature without prior approval. He says the policy is in place partly to guard against lawsuits like this one.

I think that he's talking about lawsuits brought by organizations like the ACLU who loves to scare school districts into believing that they cannot allow students to express their beliefs if they can in any way be perceived as religious in nature.

I think that this school has gotten this one 100% wrong. What about being pro-life is "religious"? Is it religious to believe that killing unborn babies is wrong? Science hasn't even been able to answer the question as to when human life begins with any certainty. Once an egg is fertilized, it has human DNA and even has been assigned a gender, hair color, eye color, etc.

I find it interesting that the school, Bridgeton High School, uses the word "moral" in both it's "mission" and "vision" statements.

Our Mission

The mission of the Bridgeton Public Schools is to have all pupils meet the Core Curriculum Content Standards and graduate from high school as lifelong learners who will make positive contributions to the community, act with the highest moral and ethical standards, promote equal opportunity, and participate in the advancement of our democratic society.

Our Vision

To create a transparent school system, with state of the art facilities, clearly focused on having all student acheive academic and interpersonal excellence, supported by committed parents, community members and staff who feel a moral obligation to help all students meet the highest standards.

Makes you wonder how they define "moral"...

Georgia Teacher Accused of Putting a 'Hit' on Student

2009-11-17T14:58:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted in a long time, but maybe it's time I get busy again. There has been a lot going on, especially since the election last year. Here's a new story from Fox News: Georgia Teacher Accused of Putting a 'Hit' on Student.
According to the article:

Forde’s attorney, Borquaye Thomas, said his client asked the student if he was gay after seeing the boy dance inappropriately with another male student, the newspaper said.

The student didn’t seem to have a problem with the question until he got into trouble for another incident, according to the Journal-Constitution.

"All of the students knew Mr. Forde was joking. The other students said Mr. Forde always plays around with them like that," Thomas told the paper. "The student only complained after he was getting suspended."

I have a feeling that this whole thing is being blown out of proportion by the student, but the teacher must be a complete fool if he was indeed "joking" in this manner. We'll have to see how this plays out before making any final judgment.

I've seen some very troubling news articles recently regarding the condition of government schools and I may post some here later this week.

If you're reading this and you're new to my blog, then welcome. If you've been here before, then thanks for stopping by again.

God bless.

Reading teachers balk at condom lesson for middle-schoolers

2009-02-02T06:58:00.000-08:00

Posted at the Reading Eagle in Reading, PA.

Safe-sex advocates preach that there are ways to make sex with condoms fun, but some Reading middle school teachers are uneasy about discussing the topic in class.

Teachers union President Daniel Grim is questioning whether a planned teen-pregnancy program in the health curriculum is appropriate for students in sixth, seventh and eighth grades.

Grim told the school board that some teachers feel the material is too graphic and they are uncomfortable teaching it.

"I recommend you take a look at this," Grim said at a board meeting Wednesday. "It's not appropriate for middle school."

Grim noted part of the program that deals with how to make condoms "fun and pleasurable." Suggested lessons include how to work a condom into foreplay and tips on making sex with condoms more physically pleasing.

The program is scheduled to begin in Reading's four middle schools this school year.

This is discusting. Teaching middle school children that sex with condoms can be fun and pleasurable? Is anyone teaching them that it is wrong? Is anyone teaching them exactly what the risks are regardless of whether they use a condom or not? It's the weirdos with a radical agenda that are driving the bus right now. Don't let them drive it in your neighborhood, even if your children are not attending these schools. These are children that we're talking about.

Police: Illinois Teacher Claims to Have Molested 75 Boys

2009-01-29T06:24:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com

An Illinois middle school teacher charged with 10 counts of illegal possession of child pornography has allegedly admitted to molesting dozens of boys.

Kenneth Lee Johnson told police he sexually abused 75 boys over the past 35 years, but those claims have not been substantiated, according to MyFOXChicago.com.

Parents, keep the line of communication wide open with your children whether they go to public school or not. I have a haunting feeling that this guy is probably estimating fairly accurately the number of children that he has harmed, and that most molesters who are caught and charged are responsible for many many more incidents than they are eventually charged with.

Also, if you pay any attention to the news, you'll see a consistent pattern of reducing charges before court, and plea agreements or deals, all resulting in convictions of lesser charges than what the perp was originally alleged to have done.

Based on that information, we can't very well look at a registered sex offender's criminal record and hope to have a good idea of what he or she has done. Nor can we look at someone without a criminal history and assume that they are not monsters. That is why we must beware and choose carefully whom we turn our children over to day after day.

Illinois Moment of Silence in Schools Ruled Unconstitutional

2009-01-22T07:07:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com

CHICAGO — A federal judge has ruled that a state law requiring a moment of silence in public schools across Illinois is unconstitutional, saying it crosses the line separating church and state.

"The statute is a subtle effort to force students at impressionable ages to contemplate religion," U.S. District Judge Robert W. Gettleman said in his ruling Wednesday.

It has come to the point where I would say that only those parents who don't want their child contemplating religion should continue to send their children to the government schools. I agree that I wouldn't necessarily want my child to be taught anything about God at a government school since I know that I wouldn't trust them to do so accurately, but to not even allow a moment of silence?

Prayer in government schools used to be non denominational and basically Christian, in agreement with the overwhelming majority of American citizen's faith and values. In 1782, the United States Congress passed the following resolution: "The Congress of the United States recommends and approves the Holy Bible for use in all schools."

The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that the First Amendment requires public school officials to be neutral in their treatment of religion, showing neither favoritism toward nor hostility against religious expression such as prayer. Good News Club v. Milford Cent. Sch., 533 U.S. 98 (2001); Everson v. Board of Educ., 330 U.S. 1 (1947).

However, in their effort to be neutral, they have swung so far to the left that they seem to think that allowing for any religious contemplation by the students is somehow crossing that line. The only people who should be comfortable with going this far to remove all consideration for any contemplation of the existance of God from our school systems are the atheists and indifferent agnostics. If that's what they want, let them have the school system. Then the government will be forced to change it or abandon it all together, allowing our money that continually goes to pay for these schools to be better spent.

By sending our children to government schools and not combating the indifference on a daily basis at home, we have been raising godless generations since the 1960s. We will reap what we sow.

Wisconsin High School Features In-Depth Homosexual Indoctrination Regimen

2009-01-19T07:00:00.000-08:00

Posted at LifeSiteNews.com.

In an effort to combat "homophobia," a Wisconsin public school teacher implemented a 38-day regimen explicitly designed to change the minds of students who did not view homosexuality as equal to heterosexuality.

11-th grade English teacher Sarah Arnold says she was inspired to create the curriculum, entitled "Exposing Hidden Homophobia," when she heard an "anti-gay undertone" in students' conversations, which included making fun of "anything that defied gender stereotype," according to an article printed in the pro-homosexual publication by the Southern Poverty Law Center "Teaching Tolerance."

"Some people would say we don't have a wide demographic variety here," Arnold said of the mostly white Elkhorn Area High School. "It's more accurate to say that we have demographics that aren't acknowledged."

[snip]

The article claims that, thanks to the program, students began to adopt a more favorable view of homosexuality, as evidenced by portfolio essays and an increased membership in the school's Gay-Straight Alliance.

Colleen Rafter, principal of Raritan High School in Hazlet, N.J., said she convinced the English department in her school to adopt a homosexuality program similar to Arnold's, according to the article.

"We really want to make a change in how people think and act," Rafter said. "I will try to be more brave on these issues myself."

There you have it. There is an agenda to "change in how people think" with regards to homosexuality. For those of you who think that your public school is "pretty good" and that your kids are a "positive influence" on the lost who also attend, don't kid yourselves. There is an agressive push to indoctrinate the children with the radical social agendas. Unless your child is just as powerful and agressive as the teachers and administrators, you are throwing them to the wolves. I beg of you to take care of your children. You are responsible for what they learn.

Like a Virgin: The Press Take On Teenage Sex

2009-01-08T11:48:00.000-08:00

Posted at The Wall Street Journal.

The chain reaction was something out of central casting. A medical journal starts it off by announcing a study comparing teens who take a pledge of virginity until marriage with those who don't. Lo and behold, when they crunch the numbers, they find not much difference between pledgers and nonpledgers: most do not make it to the marriage bed as virgins.

Like a pack of randy 15-year-old boys, the press dives right in.

"Virginity Pledges Don't Stop Teen Sex," screams CBS News. "Virginity pledges don't mean much," adds CNN. "Study questions virginity pledges," says the Chicago Tribune. "Premarital Abstinence Pledges Ineffective, Study Finds," heralds the Washington Post. "Virginity Pledges Fail to Trump Teen Lust in Look at Older Data," reports Bloomberg. And on it goes.

In other words, teens will be teens, and moms or dads who believe that concepts such as restraint or morality have any application today are living in a dream world. Typical was the lead for the CBS News story: "Teenagers who take virginity pledges are no less sexually active than other teens, according to a new study."

Here's the rub: It just isn't true.

In fact, the only way the study's author, Janet Elise Rosenbaum of Johns Hopkins University, could reach such results was by comparing teens who take a virginity pledge with a very small subset of other teens: those who are just as religious and conservative as the pledge-takers. The study is called "Patient Teenagers? A Comparison of the Sexual Behavior of Virginity Pledgers and Matched Nonpledgers," and it was published in the Jan. 1 edition of Pediatrics.

So, in other words, in order to come to the desired pre-formed conclusion, the data had to be cherry picked. It seems to me that a more accurate statement would be that teens with religious and conservative values are less likely to engage in teenage sex regardless of whether or not they take a formal virginity pledge.

It's quite clear from the recent barrage of articles based on the report referenced in the article that the goal was to diminish the value of virgiity pledges. However, the only way that the author was able to do so, was to first assume that only religious or conservative teens would actually make a virginity pledge.

What Dr. Healy was getting at is that the pledge itself is not what distinguishes these kids from most other teenagers. The real difference is their more conservative and religious home and social environment. As she notes, when you compare both groups in this study with teens at large, the behavioral differences are striking. Here are just a few:

- These teens generally have less risky sex, i.e., fewer sexual partners.

- These teens are less likely to have a teenage pregnancy, or to have friends who use drugs.

- These teens have less premarital vaginal sex.

- When these teens lose their virginity they tend to do so at age 21 -- compared to 17 for the typical American teen.

- And very much overlooked, one out of four of these teens do in fact keep the pledge to remain chaste -- amid much cheap ridicule and just about zero support outside their homes or churches.

Let's put this another way. The real headline from this study is this: "Religious Teens Differ Little in Sexual Behavior Whether or Not They Take a Pledge."

They're Having Babies. Are We Helping?

2008-12-15T08:16:00.000-08:00

This story was posted at the Washington Post on Sunday and brings up a very good point. In an effort to try and help teenagers who get pregnant, are we actually removing many of the deterrents? What we are creating is a generation of children that are raised by disinterested parties in daycare centers and government schools. These children are taught the morality of those who bear them and raise them.

"There is zero shame," agrees school nurse Runton. One girl walked into a colleague's class last month, announced that she was pregnant and began showing her sonogram around. Another 16-year-old proudly proclaimed that she was "going on maternity leave." The teacher tried to explain that maternity leave is a job benefit that doesn't apply to high school students.
[snip]
School social worker David Wynne states the obvious: "Whatever we're doing, it's not working." It's hard to say whether other school districts do any better than Alexandria at discouraging teen pregnancy. According to Brown, school sex-ed programs nationwide are a patchwork that includes everything from required HIV/AIDS education to using students as peer counselors to abstinence-only programs. No one really knows what's working where. But at T.C., I know that almost every adult involved in helping our girls seems to be at a loss, especially in the face of the rising birth rate among Hispanics.

Cynthia Quinteros, however, has a theory. "I feel that the community is afraid to talk about all the girls who are getting pregnant," she says. "Once you get pregnant, they do everything for you, but they ought to be doing all they can do to show girls how difficult their lives will be if they have a baby.

The truth is, it's still hard to do it right. It's very very easy to do it wrong. There are many mistakes that can be made in child rearing that cannot be undone, and one of the largest is allowing your child to be raise by someone who doesn't truly live him (or her).

Middle Schoolers Suspended for Sex Activities in Class

2008-12-11T08:16:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com

MIRAMAR, Fla. — Three students at a Broward County middle school have been suspended for what school officials say was inappropriate sexual activity in a classroom.

The students from Glades Middle School in Miramar were suspended this week and face expulsion. School officials and police say the students are about 13 years old and more may be involved.

Two teachers have been reassigned while the district investigates. The activity was allegedly going on in their classrooms.

Authorities have not described the inappropriate conduct.

From the story, it sounds like this activity may have taken place while a teacher was either in the room, or that it took place while the teacher was not in the room but should have been. I'm only speculating since the story states that "two teachers have been reassigned while the district investigates."

What in the world is going on in the hearts and minds of our school children? What about those who are charged with teaching them? If you want to know, just look at what's on the TV, video games, books they read, posters and ads they see, what do their friends talk about, etc.?

What do you mean you don't know?

9-year-old student charged in pencil stabbing

2008-11-24T14:38:00.000-08:00

Posted at FayObserver.com

A 9-year-old elementary school student has been charged with seriously injuring a classmate by stabbing her in the back with a pencil on Wednesday, lawmen said.

Cumberland County sheriff’s deputies charged the boy after he stabbed the 10-year-old girl at Cliffdale Road Elementary School, a news release said.

Investigators say the boy stabbed the girl with a pencil, causing a puncture wound on the upper portion of her back.

The boy stabbed the girl after an argument over a pencil box, authorities said.

According to the release, the boy found his missing pencil box in the girl’s possession.

The girl did not require emergency medical assistance and returned to school Thursday, the release said.

Detectives could charge the boy with assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury pending the outcome of the investigation, the release said.

He is in the custody of his parents at this time. School officials will handle disciplinary action against him.

Public school teachers wild on social networks

2008-11-21T08:11:00.000-08:00

Posted on World Net Daily:Public school teachers wild on social networks

As part of a disturbing new trend, America's public-school teachers are increasingly posting questionable and even sexually explicit information on video-sharing websites and social networks frequented by youth.

According to several nationwide reports, students often search for their teachers on MySpace and Facebook, and some find more information about their instructors than they ever expected.

The National Education Association listed a number of cases, while news outlets have been consistently reporting similar incidents, including the following:
Virginia – Monacan High School art teacher Stephen Murmer posted pictures of what he called "butt art" on YouTube in January 2007. He painted his buttocks and genitals and pressed them onto canvas. Many students saw his painting before the school fired him. He then contacted the ACLU and sued the district, saying it violated his First Amendment rights. Murmer reached a $65,000 settlement with the district.

A kindergarten teacher from Prince William County, Va., posted a video of a half-nude man having an orgasm in the shower, the Washington Post reported. Another Prince William County substitute teacher used MySpace to post photos of a woman lifting her dress, showing lingerie and flashing breasts.

One of the biggest things that conviced my wife and me that homeschooling was the right choice for us was what we saw when we became involved in our children's education.

My wife missed our sons when they were sent to school every day. My oldest was in 2nd grade and my next oldest was in Kindergarten. Both are boys, and we also had a 2-year old girl at the time. My wife started volunteering at the school to help the teachers in K and 2nd, and also served as a detention aid and playground monitor. The children's behavior was enought raise serious concerns about what these kids knew, how they knew it, and how they acted it out on the playground. Even more concerning was how the teachers acted when we attended their annual staff Christmas party. It was a "White Elephant" party with plenty of gag gifts that would have made a prostitute blush.

Tolerance fails T-shirt test

2008-11-13T06:52:00.000-08:00

Here's a story in the Chicago Tribune about a girl who wanted to do an experiment to test the "tolerance" of those in who pride themselves most on their "tolerance".

She noticed that there were a lot if kids who wore Obama shirts to school in support of Barak Obama for president before the election, so she decided to wear a shirt to school one day that simply said "McCain Girl" and then record the reactions she got from both students and staff.

"People were upset. But they started saying things, calling me very stupid, telling me my shirt was stupid and I shouldn't be wearing it," Catherine said.

Then it got worse.

"One person told me to go die. It was a lot of dying. A lot of comments about how I should be killed," Catherine said, of the tolerance in Oak Park.

But students weren't the only ones surprised that she wore a shirt supporting McCain.

"In one class, I had one teacher say she will not judge me for my choice, but that she was surprised that I supported McCain," Catherine said.

If Catherine was shocked by such passive-aggressive threats from instructors, just wait until she goes to college.

"Later, that teacher found out about the experiment and said she was embarrassed because she knew I was writing down what she said," Catherine said.

One student suggested that she be put up on a cross for her political beliefs.

[snip]

Only a few times did anyone say anything remotely positive about her McCain shirt. One girl pulled her aside in a corner, out of earshot of other students, and whispered, "I really like your shirt."

The next day she wore a shirt that simply said "Obama Girl". The reactions were quite different.

"People liked my shirt. They said things like my brain had come back, and I had put the right shirt on today," Catherine said.

Some students accused her of playing both sides.

"A lot of people liked it. But some people told me I was a flip-flopper," she said. "They said, 'You can't make up your mind. You can't wear a McCain shirt one day and an Obama shirt the next day.' "

But she sure did, and she turned her journal into a report for her history teacher, earning Catherine extra credit. We asked the teacher, Norma Cassin-Pountney, whether it was ironic that Catherine would be subject to such intolerance from pro-Obama supporters in a community that prides itself on its liberal outlook.

I think that anyone who clings to an ideology and then attaches a "good" name to it like "tolerant", "smart", "wise", "kind", "selfless", "progressive", etc.; is then, without much of a leap, able to label those who migh disagree with them as "intolerant", "stupid", "unwise", "unkind", "selfish", "regressive", etc. There are two dangers that I immediately see with this belief. First, it causes us to automatically throw out all of the ideas from the opposing ideology as bad ideas, even if their not, and it also can cause us to demonize those who support those ideologies. Either way, we come off looking "intolerant" and "stupid" when we're faced with our bad behavior.

Social Worker: “All Homeschoolers Get Psychological Evaluations”

2008-11-12T14:53:00.000-08:00

Here is a story that was posted on the HSLDA website yesterday. In this poor family's story, a social worker shows up at the door of a homeschool family with demands to enter the home and question the children. The social worker first refuses to disclose the reason for her visit, and then, only after talking with a lawyer with HSLDA, does she then inform the family that an alligation was made 8 months ago regarding one of their children. Now, 8 months after the alligation, this social worker acts like it some kind of emergency that the children be removed from the home and says that all homeschooled children under investigation be subjected to a psycho-social assessment. I think I know who needs the "psycho-social" assessment. This action was a blatant violation of this family's rights, and both the social worker and the police that she involved seemed to be surprised by all of this.

As a public service announcement, I'd like to refer all of my homeschool readers to a nice resource from HSLDA called "The Social Worker At Your Door: 10 Helpful Hints". If you can't open the link, and you're a homeschooler, perhaps you need to seriously consider joining the HSLDA. It may well be the best money you ever spend.

2008-11-06T10:04:00.000-08:00

Posted at the Palm Beach Post 11/06/08:

The Palm Beach County School District is moving to expand protections for gay students.

The board is seeking to exceed the requirements of a new anti-bullying policy, mandated by state law, to specifically prohibit harassing students who believe they were born the wrong gender and those who may be perceived as being too masculine or too feminine for their gender.

Because what happened to Matthew Shepherd was much worse than what happened to Jesse Dirkhising. Harassing, bullying, or beating a person is wrong regardless of the reasons for doing it.

Fast Facts on Hate Crimes II

School Clams Up on 'Gay' Pledge Cards Given to Kindergartners

2008-11-06T07:44:00.000-08:00

Article on Fox News from 11/01/2008.

A California school system refuses to say what action, if any, it will take after it received complaints about a kindergarten teacher who encouraged her students to sign "pledge cards" in support of gays.

During a celebration of National Ally Week, Tara Miller, a teacher at the Faith Ringgold School of Arts and Science in Hayward, Calif., passed out cards produced by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network to her class of kindergartners.

The cards asked signers to be "an ally" and to pledge to "not use anti-LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) language or slurs; intervene, when I feel I can, in situations where others are using anti-LGBT language or harassing other students and actively support safer schools efforts."

The school has acknowledged that the exercise was not appropriate for kindergartners.

I teach my kids to be respectful of all people. They are taught that name calling is wrong and disrespectful. Somehow, I've managed to effectively teach them this without having to explain to my kindergartners what "gay" or "lesbian" means.

School District Tells Mother She “Has No Say” in Her Son’s Education

2008-11-05T10:39:00.000-08:00

Posted on HSLDA:

Some school officials just don’t get it.

Due to difficult family circumstances, a Texas mother withdrew her son from public school and sent him to live with his grandparents in New Mexico to be homeschooled. Following proper procedure, the mother notified the school that her son was being withdrawn.

Not wanting to do anything wrong, the mother also continued communication with the school to ensure that she was fulfilling all requirements she thought existed. However, it was the school district that was wrong!

The superintendent’s secretary told the new homeschool mom that the superintendent would be the one to decide how her son was educated and that he would not “approve” homeschooling until he had met with the mother and seen the curriculum. Furthermore, the secretary stated that the mother “has no say” in her child’s education and that she was expected to continue sending him to public school unless she had the superintendent’s approval to teach him at home.

Unaware that she has the right to make educational decisions for her son, the mother fearfully prepared to comply.

Fortunately, she decided to contact HSLDA for advice. Senior Counsel Chris Klicka and his legal assistant explained that not only does the mother have the right to decide how her son is educated, but the Texas superintendent no longer has authority over the teenager because he no longer resides in the state! They explained that furthermore, even if her son had remained in Texas, the law does not require her to obtain approval to homeschool there.

Klicka wrote a letter to the superintendent explaining Texas law and included a summary of U.S. Supreme Court Decisions upholding a parent's right to direct her child's education and upbringing (See Decisions of the United States Supreme Court Upholding Parental Rights as “Fundamental”. He also warned the superintendent against contacting the mother about her son’s school attendance.

The family has not heard back from the district and the teenager is now happily being homeschooled in New Mexico.

Parents, no matter what anyone tells you, you are solely responsible for your child's education, if you decide to relenquish that responsibility to someone else, you are responsible for what that person or institution teaches your child. It's not always easy to do what's right, but it's always worth the price.

California Gay Marriage Ban...

2008-11-05T06:21:00.000-08:00

UPDATE 11/06/08): Proposition 8 passed in California. The people of California still don't want gay marriage, and they have approved a constitutional change to ensure that.

The main reason that I'm posting this story is because the Californial Teachers Asssociation is one of the primary contributors to the No on Proposition 8 in California.

The California voters had decided that they don't want same-sex marriages, the state supreme court overrulled that decision stating that it was unconstitutional, so proposition 8 was drafted to change the constitution and put it to a vote by the people.

One of the largest contributors to opposing the proposition is the California Teachers Association. Go figure.

Render Unto God...

2008-11-05T05:40:00.000-08:00

I've let this blog lie dormant for nearly a year. I've been busy with my personal life and have not been as focused on keeping up with posting. However, I believe that the election of Senator Barak Obama to be the 44th president of the United States can be largely attributed to the youth of this country. Youth who have been educated primarily in our liberal government school systems and have been taught that socialist ideas are somehow what this country needs.

I'm going to bein posting again with the hopes of convincing some parents to carefully consider their choices when first sending their children to preschool, as well as continuing to send your older children to government primary and high schools.

In the Gospels, Jesus said:

"...render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." - Luke 20:25

Our children are a gift from God. When we send them to the government school system for eight hours a day, five days a week, we have effectively rendered unto Caesar the things that are God's.

Birth leave sought for girls

2008-01-09T04:42:00.000-08:00

This story is from the Denver Post, and asks for 4 weeks maternity leave for pregnant students.

Pregnant students in a Denver high school are asking for at least four weeks of maternity leave so they can heal, bond with their newborns and not be penalized with unexcused absences.

The request is unusual in Colorado's public schools, where districts tend to deal with pregnant students or new moms with specialized programs or individualized education plans.

Denver Public Schools has no districtwide policy, leaving it up to schools to work out plans for students to continue their education.

Two counselors from East High School approached the school board last month, saying the policy at their school is unfair and inconsiderate because it forces new moms to return to school the day after being discharged from the hospital or face being charged with unexcused absences.

"My initial reaction is if we are punishing girls like that, that is unacceptable," said Nicole Head, one of the counselors who brought the matter to the school board last month. "We've got to do something."

East High School administrators could not be reached for comment over the winter break, but district officials say they are reviewing the policy on absences to make it "friendlier" to new moms, said DPS spokesman Alex Sanchez.

There is constantly a push to make society bend and react to help reduce the negative consequences of bad behavior. I agree that these girls, if they do decide to carry their babies to term and raise them up themselves, need time to heal and bond with their babies. However, bonding isn't enough. These girls need maturity and these babies need both parents and a stable, loving home.

High school diplomas should be available for these girls, but that doesn't mean that society has to make extra efforts to ensure that it is easy for these girls. It's not easy. That's a fact of life. Once you have a baby, its not easy to finish school, to go to work, to put food on the table, to put a roof over your family's head, etc. That's why you wait to engage in behaviors that can cause pregnancy until you're mature enough to be ready to deal with the lifestyle that is part of having a family.

Colorado is one of the states that has refused federal funding for abstinence-only education this year. We'll have to see how "comprehensive sex education" coupled with maternity leave and day care affects the teen pregnancy rate in Denver in the years to come. We should pray for these girls and these babies who have a tough row to hoe for perhaps the rest of their lives due to some poor decisions made by teenage kids.

Fifteen States Turn Up Noses at Money For Abstinence Education

2008-01-09T04:30:00.000-08:00

I guess its not always about the money. According to this story on LifSite News, an agenda can be more enticing than cash.

WASHINGTON, D.C., January 8, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Fifteen states around the union each have scorned as much as half a million dollars in federal education funding because the money would have to go toward abstinence education that excludes a regimen of contraceptive-pushing lessons.

The program, forwarded by the Bush administration, is being snubbed by states that are caving to the demands of schools to push contraceptive education as the only effective method for discouraging teen pregnancies.

Abstinence programs across the country are distressed at the move by the governors, who don't seem to care about the tens of thousands of families who do not want their children to be indoctrinated with a contraceptive mentality.

"It's a crime," said Judith Vogtli, director of ProjecTruth, an abstinence-education program under the auspices of Catholic Charities of Buffalo, N.Y., in an interview with the Catholic News Service on January 3. "We are constantly under attack."

Abstinence is the only thing that works 100% to prevent pregnancy and STDs. It's also the most risk free approach to avoiding the most severe negative emotional consequences that result in broken intimate relationships.

The schools in this country are going somewhere. If you don't see it now, all you have to do is look back about 50 years and see the changes that have occurred. Follow the path that we are on, and then look just 50 years into the future. How about just 10 years into the future? How about today? Is the current environment of the government school system really the place that you think that your children should be for the majority of their time?

Educator takes aim at sex misconduct

2007-12-28T05:54:00.000-08:00

Posted at The Albuquerque Tribune is an excellent article about educators actually taking some positive action to do something about this growing problem in America's school system.

Arthur Brokop, a young substitute teacher, shut the windowless door of the first-grade classroom he'd been called in to oversee.

He dimmed the lights while showing a video and, one by one, put three young girls on his lap so he could fondle them through their clothing.

The crime still haunts the school superintendent in this town surrounded by oil fields and the rugged high desert of northwestern New Mexico.

"We were negligent," superintendent Janel Ryan says, pointedly repeating a word used in a multimillion dollar civil judgment in favor of one of the victims. "It just ate me up."

Her candor is rare. So is the strength of her resolve to make sure a case like this never occurs again.

An AP investigation this fall found 2,570 educators whose teaching credentials were revoked, denied, surrendered or sanctioned from 2001 through 2005 following allegations of sexual misconduct. The AP also found that many other educators accused of sexual wrongdoing were able to make secret deals with a promise to their districts to leave quietly, some with letters of recommendation.

Even in the most public of sexual misconduct cases, school administrators are often reluctant to talk about it. Among other things, they fear embarrassment, blame and anger from parents.

But that shouldn't stop them from dealing with the issue head-on, says one expert who helps schools deal with and prevent teacher misconduct.

"The `let-sleeping-dogs-lie' mentality is counterproductive," says Robert Shoop, a Kansas State University professor who's written a book for school administrators called "Sexual Exploitation in Schools: How to Spot It and Stop It."

"My suggestion is to admit mistakes, to apologize for mistakes and to make a pledge that you're not going to let this happen again," he says. "There's no guarantee that bad stuff won't happen. But you can certainly reduce the likelihood."

I'd recommend reading the whole article. Ms. Ryan's resolve is to be commended.

Bible incident draws concerns

2007-12-27T15:43:00.000-08:00

Posted at GazetteXtra.com.

Some Janesville parents said that they're concerned that in this incident, in which a student allegedly tore pages from a Bible, the balance between the two was tipped toward the First Amendment, WISC-TV reported.

As many Parker High School students get ready for Christmas break, junior Elle Jacobson is at home and will not be returning like her friends.

"I have never felt threatened like that in a classroom before," said Jacobson.

The 17-year-old is talking about an incident in her English class two weeks ago during a class presentation.

"This boy got up and his visual aid was a Bible and a book. And he got up and started his speech by saying 'Now, this piece of crap' and pointed to the Bible."

Jacobson said that she quickly felt threatened.

"He took the Bible and he said, 'I'm going to do this because I can. I'm going to do something that your stupid, little minds aren't going to be able to comprehend and he took the Bible and started ripping out pages."

School officials said that they know about the incident.

"We take this extremely seriously," said Dr. Karen Schulte, Janesville School District safety and security coordinator.

Officials said that they will not confirm whether the boy was suspended.

According to the GazetteXtra.com, [t]he student was suspended, his mother said. She was told he couldn’t return to school until he had undergone a psychological evaluation. He was out of school for a week.

I certainly don't condone the tearing up of the Bible, but the Word of God is not the Bible, the Bible is the recorded Word of God. Tearing up a book isn't going to destroy the Word and only makes the person doing it appear foolish.

"Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away."
- Luke 21:33

This poor child is simply the product of the culture that is turning out many who think just like him, but may not be so bold as to act out in such a way. God help him and help us all.

Problem Teacher List Made Public

2007-12-21T10:37:00.000-08:00

Posted at Breitbart.com

Are you going to peek?

A confidential, nationwide list of 24,500 teachers who have been punished for a wide array of offenses was made available to the public Friday by a Florida newspaper.
The Sarasota Herald-Tribune created a searchable database of the teachers' names after waiting for years to gain access to the list. The paper began seeking the material as part of its earlier reporting on teacher sexual misconduct in Florida. It obtained the list from the Florida Department of Education.

The list, gathered and maintained by the National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification, does not provide any information on why any of the teachers were disciplined. Sexual misconduct, financial misconduct, criminal convictions and other misbehavior all can bring disciplinary actions against teacher licenses.

A nationwide Associated Press investigation earlier this year sought five years of state disciplinary actions against teachers and the reasons behind them. In the years the AP studied, 2001 to 2005, roughly one-quarter of all disciplinary actions against teachers involved sexual misconduct.

The AP's seven-month investigation found 2,570 educators whose teaching credentials were revoked, denied, surrendered or sanctioned following allegations of sexual misconduct.

The association's list is the only nationwide effort by school systems to track teachers who get into trouble, but the association does not make the information available to the public. The group is a voluntary, nonprofit organization of state education agencies.

The database is made available to other state education agencies to provide a warning to states about teachers with past problems. NASDTEC has no ability to force education officials to list all the teachers who have gotten in trouble in their states. The list also does not provide details on what teachers got in trouble for, and leaves it to states or hiring school districts to dig for more information.

Teacher Arrested After Offering Good Grades For Oral Sex

2007-12-20T10:13:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com.

This girl realized that there are some things that are much more important than good grades, and that grades should be earned in one way only. The right way.

This guy should never be allowed around children again, especially in a capacity to teach or otherwise supervise children. He is a a child predator.

BARTOW, Fla. — Police say a Bartow High School student hoping to improve her math grades through extra credit instead got a lewd request from her teacher.

Isaac Nathan Tillis was arrested after repeatedly telling student she could earn an "A" if she gave him oral sex. He lured the girl into a teacher's lounge bathroom on Wednesday, but once inside police and the girl sprung a trap.

The 16-year-old was wearing a hidden listening device, which recorded Tillis' proposition after he dropped his pants, police say. The 29-year-old teacher had also scribbled his request on a hall pass, an arrest report states.

Officers arrested Tillis and charged him with soliciting a lewd sex act from a minor.

Woman abandons home to escape public schools

2007-12-20T06:00:00.000-08:00

The saga, as reported by WorldNetDaily, continues...

A Utah woman who was ordered by a juvenile court judge to enroll her children in public school or lose custody of them has abandoned her home, furniture and other possessions to escape the order.

Denise Mafi, a nine-year veteran of homeschooling, has confirmed to WND she and her children packed up their essentials – clothes and homeschool materials – and fled Utah over the weekend, spending more than 50 hours on a bus trip to another undisclosed part of the country.

There she has obtained an empty home, and is spending the Christmas break trying to find beds for her children and herself, and after the New Year, will involve the children in a local homeschooling process.

"We're shampooing carpets right now. We have no furniture. We have no beds," she said. "But my kids are not going to public school. They are not going where Jesus isn't welcome."

Her home, furniture and other possessions left behind in Utah? "I'm not going back unless the judge removes the threat of arrest," she said. "I'll fight for the cause but I'm not going to be a martyr."

I'm sure that I would do the same thing if I were facing an order to turn my kids over to the state for their education. However, there is something missing from this story. It was reported that she was in in juvenile court due to an issue regarding a "clash among children". This brings up a question. What if a homeschooling parent has a child that is in trouble with the law. Sometimes, part of the requirements that the child must meet is regular attendance in school. I imagine that the judge has a problem with this since there is no formal record of attendance for homeschool students. For a student to attend school, they simply stay home. However, that doesn't excuse the judge from his attempt to order this mother to put all of her children in public school. The judge was quoted as saying "homeschooling fails 100 percent of the time" and that he wasn't going to allow it. Now he's shown his clear disdain for homeschooling and it looks like he's attempting to use his position to force this mother to give up her rights to educate her children as she sees fit.

I pray that she prevails in her attempt to stand up for her rights, however I pray also that her children are receiving the education, care, and guidance that they need. It seems that the father is out of the house if not completely out of the picture, and that just makes everything that much more difficult for the children.

Judge investigated for homeschooling threat

2007-12-19T05:21:00.000-08:00

An update to a story I posted on December 17, 2007 from WorldNetDaily.

A threat by a Utah judge to take away a homeschooling mom's children if she failed to enroll them in public school, and make sure they were in attendance every day, has been escalated to the level of the state Legislature, according to a homeschooling leader.

"I can tell you there are several legislators working on this, including one on the judicial retention committee," John Yarrington, president of the Utah Home Education Association, said. "There's no excuse for this kind of bias and prejudice."

At issue are the threats issued by Judge Scott Johansen, who serves in the juvenile division of the state's 7th Judicial District

He said in a court hearing for the homeschooling mom, Denise Mafi, that he would order the removal of her children from her custody if she failed to enroll her children in the public school district and keep them in class every day, unless they had a physician's note excusing them.

Mafi, who has homeschooled for nine years, told WND that she already had enrolled the children, for fear the judge would carry out his threat.

WND earlier reported the confrontation developed after the school district apparently lost an affidavit Mafi had submitted for the 2006-2007 school year.

[snip]

Yarrington said a lawyer for the UHEA is working on the case, as are lawyers for the Home School Legal Defense Association.

He said court records show the judge told the woman that she was in court with her son "because you homeschool," even though the case at hand had nothing to do with homeschooling.

And the judge told the woman that homeschooling fails 100 percent of the time and he wasn't going to allow it.

Boy, is this judge wrong. Who does he think he is? Has he forgotten that this is America and he's not the tyrannical dictator of the socialist republic of Utah? I hope that there is a course for a suit against this judge for the damage that he has already caused to this family. My prayers go out to them.

Boy Suspended For Warning Students Of Sex Offender On Campus

2007-12-17T06:47:00.000-08:00

Posted at KIRO Seattle.

Often, in the interest of protecting one person, the general pubic is put at greater risk. This is especially true in our school systems who have been tasked with protecting our children. In this case, school officials were trying to protect a registered sex offender rather than the children that have to interact with him on a daily basis at school. When one of the students found out and tried to inform the rest of the student body, for their own safety, he was reprimanded and suspended for three days. I suspect that he was punished more for pointing out the schools lack of forthcoming and less for misuse of school property, which was the stated offense.

GIG HARBOR, Wash. -- A Pierce County High School student is back in school after a three-day suspension for warning classmates about a sex offender on campus.

Last week, Raydon Gilmore found a 16-year-old fellow student at Gig Harbor High School at the Washington State Sex Offender Information Center, a Web site that lists the state's level 2 and level 3 sex offenders.

"Then it hit me that I was in P.E. freshman year, and this kid was there for a while and he was my neighbor at my locker," Gilmore told KIRO 7 Eyewitness News.

The 16-year-old was convicted of indecent liberties and using force.

Gilmore made copies of the announcement and started handing them out to classmates "to let them know that we're going to school with dangerous people and to be more aware." Three other students helped create and distribute fliers. He said minutes later, the school's principal caught up with him.

Gilmore was suspended for three days. School officials said the fliers amounted to harassment and he was interfering with other students' education, according to school documents.

"I'm frustrated that my son does something right and good and something I'm proud of, and he's being punished for it," said Meloney Garthe, Gilmore's mother.

Gilmore said he believes he did the right thing, and would do it again.

The school's principal told the News Tribune of Tacoma that the students should have brought their concerns to a teacher or an administrator. He said the students misused school property and they violated a rule that state officials must approve any materials that students post on campus walls.

So now that Mr. Gilmore has been allowed to return to school, I'd like to see him follow the recommendations of the principal and request approval to post this information on the campus walls.

Mom threatened with jail for teaching kids at home

2007-12-17T06:35:00.000-08:00

Posted at WorldNetDaily.

Note to self: "Bring all documentation directly to the district office and keep copies for my own records".

A homeschooling mom in Utah has been ordered by a judge to enroll her children in a public school district within 24 hours, and have them in class tomorrow, all because of a paperwork glitch that very well could be the fault of the district.

The mother, Denise Mafi, told WND that she already has enrolled her children in the district, under the threat from Judge Scott Johansen, who serves in the juvenile division of the state's 7th Judicial District, that he would order her children taken away from her.

As WND has reported previously, such threats are becoming more and more common in Germany, but that nation still lives by a Nazi-era law that makes homeschooling illegal.

Mafi told WND that not only is homeschooling legal in Utah, she's been at it for nearly a decade.

So what's the problem here?

It seems that an affidavit she faxed to the local school district for the 2006-2007 school year, documenting her homeschooling plans, was lost by the district. So when she went to court with her juvenile son to have the charges dismissed (under a case held in abeyance procedure) stemming from a clash among children, she suddenly was presented with four counts against her for failing to comply with the state's compulsory education requirement.

The idea that this parent has to enroll her children in public school until the paper work is completely filed, even though there's a good chance that it was actually lost by the school district, is ridiculous.

Internet Corruption

2007-12-14T06:56:00.000-08:00

Posted at BillOReilly.com

Unfettered access to the Internet is destructive to a child. If you're going to allow your child to use the Internet, you must constantly monitor their activities. It's not like you're sending them out to play in the back yard.

Here's what many parents and grandparents do not understand: The Internet is profoundly changing the behavior of American children and stunting their emotional growth. Many eight-year-olds now exposed to things that 13-year-olds didn't know just a decade ago.

In Syracuse, New York, not exactly Sodom, at least nine girls, ages 11 to 13, took nude pictures of themselves and electronically sent them to various boys. Quicker than you can say "incredibly dumb," said pictures were posted on the Internet so that every kid in town could take a look.

A 17-year-old, Michael Wixson, has been arrested but not for posting the pictures on the 'net; apparently that's legal in New York state if there's no sexual activity involved. No, Wixon was only charged after he sent the naked pictures to a 15-year-old—that involved "corrupting a minor."

Police say they were stunned that some of the parents of the involved girls thought this was no big deal. In fact, according to reporting by WSYR-TV, a few of the parents are angry with the cops for even investigating!

So now we get a hint as to why their children would do such a thing.

Look, the truth is that many kids are stupid, but kids have always been dumb. I broke records for dumbness. The difference today is that dopey kids find each other very fast on the 'net, and what they see and hear on the machines that now dominate their lives has changed their thinking patterns.

Every child can see images of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton flaunting their sexuality without consequence. Kids have instant access to salacious material that was very difficult to obtain just ten years ago. If a parent is not proactive in monitoring computer and cell phone use, children can run wild in cyberspace.

Sadly, adult reaction in some cases is capitulation. As reported in this space a few weeks ago, the school board in Portland, Maine, not exactly Gomorrah, voted to give 11-year-old girls birth control pills and not tell their parents. Now every kid in that city has gotten the message: If you want to have sex, it's okay with school authorities.

The Internet has broken down almost all boundaries. There are now actual clubs for child molesters—websites that tell predators how to abuse kids, where to find them, and how to get away with the evil act.

There are torture websites, virtual child porn displays (which the Supreme Court ruled legal), and all kinds of criminal acts acted out on the computer screen. And every kid with a mouse can find these things.

Just think about what's happening here. Children as young as eleven sending nude pictures of themselves to their friends. No fear, no hesitation.

It is a high-tech "Lord of the Flies," a free-for-all of destructive behavior driven by millions of innocuous-looking machines that sit openly in family rooms all across the country.

Here's an instant message every parent should understand: The situation is dire.

Maybe your child should be playing out in the back yard instead.

Officials review actions of school nurse in Wilder, ID

2007-12-11T05:16:00.000-08:00

Posted at the Idaho Statesman.

Officials with the Wilder School District in southwest Idaho say they are looking at the district's policies regarding birth control.
The policies are being scrutinized after Lisa Fernandez complained her 15-year-old daughter was given a pelvic exam and a shot of the birth control Depo Provera without the parent's knowledge.

Superintendent Daniel Ariola says that in the last two months an unidentified nurse has taken at least four female students to the Southwest District Health Department where they received contraceptives.

Ariola says Wilder is facing an epidemic of teen pregnancies, and that three years ago 18 students reported they were pregnant.

He says that caused the district to start teaching children to be more responsible, and to provide services to sexually active teens who are too scared to go talk to their parents.

Children are only scared to talk to their parents, because they're usually scared that their parents won't approve. It has become about giving children what they want rather than what they need. This nurse has gone WAY over the bounds.

Teacher Accused of Using High School as Personal Meth Lab

2007-12-05T05:30:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com.

A high school chemistry teacher found himself in hot water over the weekend when he was charged with making methamphetamine in his school lab, the Bakersfield Californian reported.

Jeff Scheidemantel, 32, who taught at Shafter High School, came under suspicion when he went online to buy red phosphorus, an important ingredient for making the drug, from a supplier outside the U.S.

After a month long investigation, police moved in on Saturday and searched Scheidemantel’s home and the school’s chemistry lab, where they confiscated several weapons and meth recipes, the Californian reported.

During the search of the lab, cops discovered chemicals necessary to begin producing the drug, authorities told the Californian, but no evidence of the finished drug at the school.

Click here to read the Bakersfield Californian story.

When cops bust a meth lab, the clean-up process can be quite daunting. According to a report from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment,

Methamphetamine production is associated with the release of numerous chemicals, such as volatile organic compounds (VOCs), acids, bases,metals and chemical salts, in addition to methamphetamine itself. Specific chemical residues may vary depending on the cooking process that is utilized. Airborne contaminants are absorbed or deposited onto surfaces such as rugs, furniture, drapes, and walls and may also enter and contaminate heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems. Chemical spills are not uncommon and may also impact residential surfaces. Presence of these chemicals may pose a health-risk to residents who reoccupy these structures after seizure (CEPHE 2003).

This is some nasty stuff to be exposing our children to. This guy, if he indeed was producing meth in a school lab, should be charged with a lot more the drug production, he should be charged with putting the health of all the children and teachers at that school at serious risk, and be forced to pay for the eventual clean up of the school.

Protect your children!

2007-12-03T08:29:00.000-08:00

Posted at WorldNetDaily.

Are you looking for some good news?
Do you want evidence Americans are still willing to fight back against the tide of coercive immorality?

Is there really a chance this generation will recognize injustice and abuse and indoctrination and make the sacrifices necessary to ending it?

I got a morale boost this week reading about the way a large group of parents in Iowa responded when their government school district imposed a "cross-dressing day" on their kids.

When a Des Moines public school encouraged an event it characterized as a "gender-bender," where boys dressed as girls and girls as boys, dozens of families – and perhaps as many as 200 – pulled their kids out of the high school permanently.

Many of the parents apparently are members of the Christ Apostolic Temple in Des Moines, which teaches a biblically based doctrine of rejecting the world's values. One wonders why it took this much provocation for parents to comprehend the extent of child abuse now pervasive in government schools throughout the U.S. But, the good news is they finally got it!

What would you do if your school sponsored such an indoctrination tactic? Or maybe I should rephrase that question: What will you do when your school sponsors such an indoctrination tactic?

Do you even know what your school is "teaching" your kids? Or, are you trusting worldly authorities to do what's right? Are you abdicating your biblical – not to mention common sense – responsibility to train up your own children in the ways they should go?

I am so encouraged by the response in Iowa. This is the way – the only way – we can "take America back," as I wrote in my book of the same name years ago.

Americans need to start waking up and taking appropriate action. Don't wait for leaders to arise. Be a leader! Take responsibility – especially for your own family, your own children!

That's what the parents in Iowa did – finally. When more parents take this action, we will be on our way toward taking America back. It won't be because we elect people to the local school boards. It won't be because we elect the right president. It won't be because we elect one party or the other to a majority in Congress. It will be because a remnant of American citizens remembers we are supposed to be a self-governing people and do what is necessary to protect our children and, thus, the future of this nation.

We're seeing more of this kind of child abuse on a daily basis in America – and it is no accident. It is not a matter of chance. It is not the exception; it is the rule. This is where we are all headed unless you take control of your life and the lives of your children today.

Read the entire article. It's refreshing to see that people are willing to do what's right for their children AND the future of America. Don't wait too long to do something. It's your children that you are putting at stake.

Report: Florida Student Facing Battery Charges for Throwing Crayon at Teacher

2007-11-29T13:51:00.000-08:00

Posted at FOXNews.com.

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A 14-year-old Florida student on Thursday was facing a third-degree battery charge after throwing a crayon at his teacher, FOX affiliate WAWS reports.

Taewon Little was kicked out of the A. Philip Randolph Academy in Jacksonville and arrested, but his mother said the punishment is too harsh and called her son a model student.

"I felt like they really blew this out of proportion by charging my child with a misdemeanor and taking him to court," Robyn Little said.

Robyn Little said she grounded her son for the act but added that he has never missed a day of school and even attends college preparatory classes on Saturdays.

The school’s principal said Taewon Little will not be allowed re-entry into the school until he completes courses in an alternate learning program.

When I was 14 and going to school, in any given classroom, there were probably 5-10 kids at the very most of of about 30 per classroom that I would suspect would ever even remotely consider throwing something at the teacher. None of them would I consider "model students". Smart? Yeah. Well liked? Sure. A model student? No way.

School Officials Ban Organizations from Offering Bibles

2007-11-29T13:09:00.000-08:00

Posted at Christian Action League.

FAYETTEVILLE — School officials in Cumberland and Harnett counties who have banned organizations from offering Bibles to elementary students may want to beef up their studies of Constitutional case law and reconsider their decisions.

"In their efforts to appease the American Civil Liberties Union, these eastern North Carolina school systems are violating citizens' First Amendment rights to free speech and failing to acknowledge a 2001 Supreme Court ruling," said Christian Action League Executive Director Rev. Mark Creech.

The Cumberland County Public Schools notified elementary principals Nov. 19 to prohibit Bibles or other "poselytizing texts" from being handed out, citing a 1998 federal case (Peck v. the Upshur County Board of Education). The board's decision followed a nearly identical ruling by the adjacent Harnett County Schools earlier in November. Both were in response to legal threats from the ACLU, which reported complaints about Bibles being made available for students by The Gideons International, an evangelistic group known for its Scripture sharing efforts.

Both boards cited fears that the Gideon Bibles (actually, New Testaments which are typically placed on tables in a classroom for students who may choose to pick one up) would be misconstrued as the school's endorsement of a specific religion and violate the Establishment Clause.

Fear and intimidation are the reasons that schools are buckling-under to ACLU demands. As parents, we need to support our schools and fight these clowns who think that they can strip away the things that have made this country great. It's a misinterpretation of the U.S. Constitution that is being used as a club to force schools to ban good people from trying to reach the children in your school who probably aren't getting any exposure to the Holy Bible in their homes.

Abstinence Activist Elected to School Board that Fired Him

2007-11-28T05:29:00.000-08:00

Posted at Life Site News.

After being fired for promoting abstinence among students at the school where he worked, ex school supervisor Chris Lind has been elected to the Prior Lake-Savage district school board in Minnesota.

Lind, who was a hallway and parking lot supervisor at a local high school and a "conservative Christian" was told by District Human Resource Director Tony Massaros that he could not discuss abstinence from sexual activity with any students, during or after school hours, on or off campus, according to a friend who witnessed the meeting.

Lind was told that this restriction included Sunday Bible school classes at his own church, and it even extended to former students of the school. He was also told to take down his "My Space" website, which purportedly gave advice to the many students who sought his counsel.

However, after the Prior Lake-Savage School District fired Lind on the recommendation of Superintendent Tom Westerhaus, the voters returned him to the District in the months following, electing him to the school board early this month.

Westerhaus soon after announced his resignation, stating that he couldn't continue to function as the employee of the man whom he had fired so recently.

What galled Westerhaus the most was the fact that the people of the school district had clearly sided with Lind. "It isn't that one person. It's the 3,400 people who said he's one of the best candidates for School Board," Westerhaus told a local reporter. "I'm being told this was courageous. I don't know that's what this was, but I'm taking a stand. Maybe that's what we need now in education more than ever."

Chuck Darrell of the Minnesota Family Council, noted that the school district that fired Lind has a "sex ed program" that promotes promiscuity and unnatural sexual behavior. "Perhaps Lind would have kept his job if he had limited his discussions to other comprehensive sex education topics such as how to get an abortion or oral sex with a dental dam," Darrell writes on MFC's blog, which has covered the issue for months.

"The recent rise in STDs and STIs in Minnesota is proof that current sex education curricula are a colossal failure," says Darrell. "And, as long as schools continue to fire personnel for promoting abstinence then we can only expect more of the same."

Although Lind will soon be a school board member, he has not ruled out the possibility of a lawsuit against the same board for his firing.

Parents, indeed you do have a voice. The liberal left wants to silence you, and they will as long as we allow it. In this instance, the people have clearly spoken and a man who was fired for trying to protect children has now been elevated to a position over those who sent him out. This story is truly inspiring and shows what can be accomplished if we just stay the course and don't give up.

Digital Age Adds New Dimension to Incidents of Staff-Student Sex

2007-11-28T05:25:00.000-08:00

Excerpted from Education Week.

Abusers can use the Internet, e-mail, or text messaging, for example, to constantly pursue students, in and out of school. In some extreme cases, they may use the Web in a way that magnifies the abuse exponentially, as a 6th grade teacher in Vermont did recently when he was charged with using his students as models for his homemade child pornography.

At the same time, the electronic trail left by such communications can present evidence for authorities investigating allegations of educator misconduct. For some officials, that trail has become an invaluable tool in rooting out bad actors even when they don’t have a cooperating victim.

If your child has access to the Internet and/or a personal cell phone, you must monitor their communications. It is not an invasion of privacy, it is a parent protecting a child in love. A child who protests a parent's involvement, can simply do without.

A Lingering Shame

2007-11-28T05:20:00.000-08:00

A collection of stories regarding the sexual abuse of students by school employees posted at Education Week.

Most of America's educators are dedicated professionals who wouldn’t dream of crossing the line into sexual conduct with a student. But a small slice of school employees do not respect that boundary. Their crimes can leave indelible scars on their victims, severely damage families, and cause lasting harm to entire school communities. How to recognize and combat the threat posed by such educators is an issue that no education policymaker, administrator, teacher, or parent can afford to ignore.

This special collection of stories, "A Lingering Shame: Sexual Abuse of Students by School Employees," assembles reporting on a problem that is only sporadically recognized as a national issue. The collection features a three-day 2007 Associated Press series on teacher sexual misconduct based on a seven-month investigation by AP reporters across the country. Some of the stories in the series appeared in the October 24, 2007, issue of Education Week; the entire series is available here.

The collection also highlights special Education Week coverage, including "A Trust Betrayed," an award-winning series based on a six-month investigation the paper conducted in 1998, as well as an update of the series based on fresh research done five years later.

St. Lucie sex ed opponents protest at official's home

2007-11-28T04:53:00.000-08:00

Posted at PalmBeachPost.com

Opponents of the St. Lucie County School District's controversial sex education curriculum have a message for school board members: Vote "yes" and you can expect to see your picture alongside descriptions of sex acts posted all over town.

Bryan Longworth, an associate pastor at a Port St. Lucie church, said he plans to send board members a flier with descriptions taken from the curriculum, called Get Real About AIDS, and space for the picture of anyone who approves it as a "warning."

"They need to know that they're not just going to be able to vote for this without anyone knowing what they approved," he said Tuesday.

The school board plans to have a public forum from 9 a.m. to noon Dec. 8 at its district offices in Fort Pierce to get public comments on the proposed curriculum and will vote on it at its regular meeting on Dec. 11.

This could get interesting. I wonder if board members would be so quick to vote for the "comprehensive sex education" curriculum that is being brought into school systems these days if they were to be publicly and visibly associated with the things that it actually says. Hmmmm.

Where Do Teachers Draw the Line When it Comes to Restraining Students?

2007-11-27T05:46:00.000-08:00

A story from West Palm Beach, FL posted at WPEC News 12 - News12Now.

A local mom has reached out to News 12 after she says a school went overboard while restraining her child.
Isaiah Moore came home from Oak Hammock K-8 last April looking like he had just been in a fight. But the autistic boy's injuries didn't come from a scuffle, he was restrained by a school staffer.
Moore's mother obtained a tape from a security camera at the school. She says it shows the 7-year-old being forced into a room, where she believes her son was violently restrained.
A few moments later, the video shows the disabled boy emerging from the room with school staffers and being dragged down the hallway by a behavior analyst. The boy is holding his back, as if he were in pain.
Moore says her son was unjustly restrained.
The forceful action left the 7-year-old with injuries, including many bruises on his arms and a busted lip. The boy's mother says he was restrained for simply walking out of his classroom.
Moore is demanding the school board change it's restraining policy and she's taking it all the way to the State Board of Education.
What do you think?
Watch the video...

I don't see any inappropriate behavior in the video. It's been my experience that many injuries that occur when a person is being restrained are self inflicted. I'm not saying that the child was not injured by the school authorities, only that the video doesn't show anything inappropriate and that it's not unheard-of for a child to hurt himself while resisting. Teachers need to be able to deal with unruly children without worrying whether or not the child is going to hurt himself. It's a fine line that has to be walked.

Home-school kids barred from activities

2007-11-26T07:24:00.000-08:00

Posted at Newsday.com (NY).

Uriah Pissalidis, 16, a drummer from Baldwin, has played a modest concert for family with other members of his fledgling rock band.

But he hasn't had the chance to perform before cheering crowds with his school district's jazz or marching bands.

Because Uriah and his sister Rebecca, 12, are home-schooled, they aren't permitted to participate in extracurricular activities in the Baldwin Union Free School District.

"It's like pushing your nose against the glass," Uriah said. "It's there, but you can't get it."

Their father, Alex, 45, said he has tried for a year to get permission for his children to participate in activities, arguing that they are entitled to because he pays more than $5,000 yearly in school taxes.

"This is almost a form of discrimination," said the father, who home-schools his children because he feels he is more interested in their welfare and can better teach needed life skills.

While his request was denied at a recent school board meeting, Pissalidis said he would continue his quest.

The district said in a statement that it "is under no legal obligation to provide extracurricular services to home-schooled children" and it "is not prepared to undertake the additional costs" associated with opening up the services to students not enrolled in district schools.

This is a strong-arm tactic to try and get more parents to reject homeschooling so that their kids can have access to these activities. However, it is my firm belief that it is not worth it.

On Terrorism from [a] 14 yr old daughter

2007-11-21T07:27:00.000-08:00

Posted at Free Republic.

Subject: Terrorism
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2007 21:11:03 +0000

Okay so there's this teacher in my school who teaches a terrorism class. I'm not in this class. Anyways, she hung up a poster outside her classroom that said: TERRORISM- write your opinion of terrorism. It's been up for about three weeks. Over the weeks, this poster has accumulated all of about 6 random useless and stupid comments that are about 3 words long on average. Most of them were about a certain kid in our school who finds great fascination in Hitler and Saddam, etc. So after a while, I got ticked off that nobody wanted to write down a solid opinion. So today, in the ten minutes before I left for choir, I decided to write down what I thought. This is almost word for word.

-----
"Well since no one is writing anything useful on here, I might as well add my comments. I believe that terrorism is Islamic extremists who want nothing more than to personally murder every single person that isn't a Muslim. There's no one they hate more than America. They want to DESTROY our notion (sic). They want to kill all of us, regardless of race, gender, or political affiliation. Therefore, I believe that terrorism is incredibly relevant to our lives today, it is horridly frightening, and is nothing less than pure EVIL. This is my opinion, and I am NOT backing off.

God bless our troops!"
-----

Now I know not all of that is completely accurate, like the fact that they probably hate the Jews more than Americans, but I wrote this incredibly quickly, in like less than ten minutes.

Anyway, I wrote this RIGHT before I left school for choir. When I got back from choir less than two hours later, the poster was GONE.

I refuse to believe this is a coincidence. If this had been up there for more than three weeks, why would they suddenly take it down when somebody decides to speak their mind? Have we really become so sensitive? Since when is being intolerant to Christians okay, but being intolerant to terrorists not okay?

She's right, you know.

Let 'em read

2007-11-21T07:08:00.000-08:00

Posted at The Daily Tar Heel.

A Fayetteville mother recently filed a complaint with the American Civil Liberties Union after an unknown source placed a stack of Bibles in her son's fifth-grade classroom.

Because students were neither encouraged to take a Bible nor discouraged from it, we find no problem with simply making them available. However, it would still behoove the school to formally state its policy on distribution of literature by outside groups.

Had there been a stack of brochures for a local soccer team sitting there, no one would have ever complained that soccer fanatics were trying to brainwash their children into believing that soccer is the greatest sport ever.

Regardless, the school system's policy allows outside groups to make information available to students. This would apply to any other religious texts, too.

The First Amendment guarantees only that the government cannot establish a national religion, or infringe on the rights of free worship. The simple presence of Bibles does not violate either of these provisions.

The federal circuit appeals court that encompasses North Carolina ruled in 1998 that having Bibles available doesn't violate the Constitution, but confined the issue to secondary schools because students in grades one to four could misinterpret the presence of religious materials as an endorsement.

Since the students in question are fifth-graders, the effect of this ruling is somewhat unclear. But the school could clarify things by stating that other religious groups could contribute their texts, too.

So long as the Quran, the Torah and any other religious text can be distributed next to the Bible, then it doesn't seem unfair to make the information available.

Religion doesn't have to be a controversial presence in America, but if nervous and overprotective parents don't watch it, their impressionable young children will grow to see all religion as dangerous and detrimental.

The First Amendment limits the reach of government to establish a national religion or to prohibit the free expression of religion. Some folks need to get a grip on this.

School says Thanksgiving is for 'mourning'

2007-11-21T05:41:00.000-08:00

Posted at WorldNetDaily.

Seattle school officials are telling teachers that Thanksgiving actually is a time of "mourning" since it represents "500 years of betrayal."

The message to all "staff" in the Seattle Public Schools comes from Caprice D. Hollins, the director of "Equity, Race & Learning Support," and other officials including Willard Bill Jr. of the "Office of Native American Education."

"With so many holidays approaching we want to again remind you that Thanksgiving can be a particularly difficult time for many of our Native students," the letter said.

The school letter refers educators to a website, Oyate, run by an outside organization that promotes Indian culture, and recommends teachers explore it.

"Here you will discover ways to help you and your students think critically, and find resources where you can learn about Thanksgiving from a Native American perspective," the letter said. "Eleven myths are identified about Thanksgiving, take a look at No. 11 and begin your own deconstruction."

The website's "Myth No. 11" is that "Thanksgiving is a happy time."

"Fact: For many Indian people, 'Thanksgiving' is a time of mourning, of remembering how a gift of generosity was rewarded by theft of land and seed corn, extermination of many from disease and gun, and near total destruction of many more from forced assimilation. As currently celebrated in this country, 'Thanksgiving' is a bitter reminder of 500 years of betrayal returned for friendship," the website describes.

The website posting called "Deconstructing the Myths of 'The First Thanksgiving," goes further. The writing by Judy Dow and Beverly Slapin also speculates on the psychology of Thanksgiving.

"What is it about the story of 'The First Thanksgiving' that makes it essential to be taught in virtually every grade from preschool through high school? What is it about the story that is so seductive? Why has it become an annual elementary school tradition to hold Thanksgiving pageants, with young children dressing up in paper-bag costumes and feather-duster headdresses and marching around the schoolyard? Why is it seen as necessary for fake 'pilgrims' and fake 'Indians' (portrayed by real children, many of whom are Indian) to sit down every year to a fake feast, acting out fake scenarios and reciting fake dialogue about friendship? And why do teachers all over the country continue (for the most part, unknowingly) to perpetuate this myth year after year after year?" the two write.

"Is it because as Americans we have a deep need to believe that the soil we live on and the country on which it is based was founded on integrity and cooperation? This belief would help contradict any feelings of guilt that could haunt us when we look at our role in more recent history in dealing with other indigenous peoples in other countries. If we dare to give up the 'myth' we may have to take responsibility for our actions both concerning indigenous peoples of this land as well as those brought to this land in violation of everything that makes us human," the two said.

"In terms of what they were seeing in some of the use of the feathers and those things because those are of spiritual and ceremonial significance to us," Bill, the school district official, told KING5 Television in Seattle.

But the "political correctness" of such evaluations and recommendations simply goes too far, others said.

"I think anything you are thankful for is great," parent D.D. Boutwell told the station.

"I think it gets to be silly," said parent Deb Bush.

"We need to free ourselves so that we can manifest that true love and kindness and compassion that's necessary to heal the wounds," Phil Lane, Jr., of the United Indians of All Tribes Foundation, told the station.

The district, as part of its website guidelines, suggests being careful about "celebrating" a "tradition," rather than "educating."

"Celebrating without educating can also impinge upon another student's belief or values," the district warns.

OrbusMax.com has provided links to some of the documentation in the case, such as the school letter.

"We appreciate your willingness to struggle with these complex issues by considering the impact on many of our Native students when teaching about Thanksgiving in traditional ways," the letter said.

Among the other "myths" addressed by the outside website are: The Mayflower passengers were called "Pilgrims." ("Pilgrims are people who travel for religious reasons, such as Muslims who make a pilgrimage to Mecca"), the Pilgrims "shared" with the Indians ("They actually stole corn and ransacked people's houses, even a cemetery"), and Thanksgiving was the beginning "of a long, harmonious friendship between the Pilgrims and Native people."

According to the Pilgrim Hall Museum, there are 2 (and only 2) primary sources for the events of autumn 1621 in Plymouth:

Edward Winslow, Mourt's Relation :

"our harvest being gotten in, our governour sent foure men on fowling, that so we might after a speciall manner rejoyce together, after we had gathered the fruits of our labours ; they foure in one day killed as much fowle, as with a little helpe beside, served the Company almost a weeke, at which time amongst other Recreations, we exercised our Armes, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king Massasoyt, with some ninetie men, whom for three dayes we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five Deere, which they brought to the Plantation and bestowed on our Governour, and upon the Captaine and others. And although it be not always so plentifull, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so farre from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plentie."

William Bradford, Of Plimoth Plantation :

"They begane now to gather in ye small harvest they had, and to fitte up their houses and dwellings against winter, being all well recovered in health & strenght, and had all things in good plenty; fFor as some were thus imployed in affairs abroad, others were excersised in fishing, aboute codd, & bass, & other fish, of which yey tooke good store, of which every family had their portion. All ye somer ther was no want. And now begane to come in store of foule, as winter approached, of which this place did abound when they came first (but afterward decreased by degrees). And besids water foule, ther was great store of wild Turkies, of which they tooke many, besids venison, &c. Besids, they had about a peck a meale a weeke to a person, or now since harvest, Indean corn to yt proportion. Which made many afterwards write so largly of their plenty hear to their freinds in England, which were not fained, but true reports."

However, there are many who have revised history to support their beliefs, and choose not to let the facts get in the way. Thanksgiving is a time to thank the almighty God for all He has given us and all that He does for us.

He who observes the day, observes it for the Lord, and he who eats, does so for the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who eats not, for the Lord he does not eat, and gives thanks to God.
- Romans 14:6

Happy Thanksgiving, and God bless you all.

Freaked Out: Teens' Dance Moves Split a Texas Town

2007-11-19T14:11:00.000-08:00

Posted at the Wall Street Journal.

ARGYLE, Texas -- Karen Miller, 53 years old, saw her first "freak dance" four years ago when she was chaperoning a high-school dance attended by her freshman daughter.

One boy was up close to a girl's back, bumping and grinding to the pounding beat of the music.

"I thought, 'That's just dadgum nasty,'" Ms. Miller recalls. "It really had me sick to my stomach."

Ms. Miller took the initiative and broke it up. School employees at the dance seemed oblivious, she says.

They're oblivious no longer. A new resolve by school officials in this booming Dallas suburb to crack down on sexually suggestive dancing -- and skimpy clothing -- has sparked a rancorous debate over what boundaries should be set for teenagers' self-expression. Argyle joins a long list of other schools around the country that have banned the hip-hop inspired dancing known as "grinding" or "freak dancing."

But in Argyle, a once-sleepy farming community strained by explosive growth from an influx of well-to-do suburbanites, the controversy has gotten vicious. Some parents blame the newly installed school superintendent, Jason Ceyanes, 35, for ruining their children's October homecoming dance by enforcing a strict dress code and making provocative dancing off-limits. Disgusted, a lot of kids left, and the dance ended early.

Mr. Ceyanes says he fears current cleavage-baring dress styles combined with sexually charged dancing could lead to an unsafe environment for students.

"This is not just shaking your booty," he said. "This is pelvis-to-pelvis physical contact in the private areas...and then moving around."

To make his point, Mr. Ceyanes held a community meeting and played a video pulled from YouTube demonstrating freak dancing. "I cannot imagine that there is a father in this room who could watch this video and be all right with a young man dancing with his daughter in that fashion," he told the gathering.

If this is the only way that your teen knows how to dance, then maybe they shouldn't be going to any dances, ban or no-ban on freak dancing.

'Silence' on hold for now

2007-11-16T06:35:00.000-08:00

More on the Illinois "Moment of Silence" issue in public schools.

Posted at the chicagotribune.com.

School districts looking for clarity on how to handle the new Illinois law mandating a moment of silence at the start of the school day will have to wait.

A federal judge on Thursday ordered the superintendent of the Illinois State Board of Education not to issue any directive on how the pause should be approached. He also held that no district should be punished for ignoring the law.

But that changes little, because the state superintendent's office hasn't yet sought to enforce the statute that took effect in October.

By the action, U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman essentially froze the controversy over the moment of silence as he considers a lawsuit brought against Township High School District 214 in the northwest suburbs.

On Wednesday Gettleman issued a preliminary injunction barring the district—but that district only—from holding the moment of silence while the lawsuit progresses through court.

Gettleman has called the Silent Reflection and Student Prayer Act vague and "likely unconstitutional" but said he would not yet issue a statewide injunction. That could change in the coming weeks if the judge grants an expected motion to include all of the state's 680 districts as defendants.

Allow me to clarify my position on this issue. To "mandate" prayer is no better than to "ban" prayer. The constitution is all about freedom. One should be free to pray or not to pray. To "mandate" a moment of silence is not the same as madating prayer. To suggest that the moment of silence can be used for prayer is not a mandate for prayer.

Sign Of Times: NJ School Cameras Fed Live To Cops

2007-11-14T11:59:00.000-08:00

Posted at wcbstv.com in NJ.

Surveillance cameras rolling inside our local schools is nothing new, but what's taking place inside Demarest's public schools is truly cutting edge: a live feed from more than two dozen cameras with a direct connection to the police.

It's an expensive, but effective tool that could be a sign of the times with an increase in school shootings over the years.

The system, which cost about $28,000, can even track movement in a crowded room.

"When they arrive, they can pull up the school's live feed and do a sweep instantly," Demarest Police Chief James Powderley tells CBS 2.

Patrolling officers have access to the video feed from headquarters and several laptops. To address privacy concerns, all of the cameras are installed in public areas and are not equipped to pick up audio.

The video capabilities are extremely impressive. Each of the laptops can pick up 16 different angles at one time, turning a single operator into a mobile surveillance team.

In an emergency situation, Powderley says the cameras -- complete with zoom and pan functions -- also cut down search and response times. "One officer has 17 eyes in multiple locations. It's amazing," he says.

Schools Superintendent Larry Hughes says if nothing else, the ability to digitally timestamp and archive the video should discourage bad, even criminal behavior.

"It doesn't hurt that people know and that if something is going to take place at your facility, if it does deter people from doing that, it's an added benefit," says Hughes.

Students seem pleased with the high-tech devices.

"I would want the police to be there right away if something happened to our school. Especially with all these bomb scares happening now, I know the high school had a couple," says one student.

It's a shame that things would have to come to this level of expense and attention. I guess that if we can't allow adequate amounts of discipline in the schools, and we aren't willing to administer it at home, all that is left is the police.

PBS Telling Teachers to Violate First Amendment, Group Says

2007-11-14T06:09:00.000-08:00

Posted at CNSNews.com

A packet for educators issued by the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) in conjunction with the NOVA program "Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial" encourages teaching practices that are probably unconstitutional, a conservative organization stated on Tuesday.

"The NOVA/PBS teaching guide encourages the injection of religion into classroom teaching about evolution in a way that likely would violate current Supreme Court precedents about the First Amendment's Establishment Clause," said John West, vice president for public policy and legal affairs at the Discovery Institute, in a news release.

The 22-page document is a companion piece to the two-hour NOVA docudrama, "Judgment Day," airing on most network affiliates Tuesday night. The film is about a trial concerning intelligent design that took place in Dover, Pa., in 2005.

The guide claims to provide teachers with "easily digestible information to guide and support you in facing challenges to evolution."

In the booklet, teachers are instructed to use such discussion questions as: "Can you accept evolution and still believe in religion?" The answer to that query is provided as: "Yes. The common view that evolution is inherently antireligious is simply false."

"This statement is simplistic and not neutral among different religions, and in that sense arguably inconsistent with Supreme Court teachings concerning neutrality," said attorney Casey Luskin, program officer for public policy and legal affairs at the institute.

"The Supreme Court ruled in Epperson v. Arkansas that the government must maintain 'neutrality between religion and religion,'" said Randal Wenger, a Pennsylvania attorney who filed amicus briefs in the Kitzmiller v. Dover School District case.

"Because the briefing packet only promotes religious viewpoints that are friendly towards evolution, this is not neutral, and PBS is encouraging teachers to violate the First Amendment's Establishment Clause," Wenger added.

Natural evolution is still a "faith-based" belief system established upon the interpretation of evidence found in our natural world. To teach that one interpretation is more plausible than a conflicting interpretation due to either consensus or misrepresentation of the facts is simply wrong. Many evolutionists like to make the claim that the theory is fully compatible with a belief in a god, any god. However, the theory in and of itself teaches that the bible is wrong beginning with the first book of Genesis. This is a full frontal attack on the Evangelical Christian faith. If you're going to try and attack my faith and the faith that I am instilling in my children, you had better come more equipped than with just your favorite interpretation of the available evidence. Truth be known, all of the evidence supports the truth and the only evidence as to the origins of the universe come from the One who created it. Evolutionism is indoctrinated into our children in the government school system as a fact. The interpretation of the evidence is presented as fact, and alternative interpretations, any that invoke a Deity of any kind, are either completely ignored or mocked as foolishness by educators. Evidence that refutes natural evolutionism is also ignored, chastised as "Creationism", or swept under the proverbial rug.

Teacher sex abuse cases reveal patterns

2007-11-12T07:09:00.000-08:00

Excerpted from Boston.com

"These people do a tremendous amount of harm to children, but oftentimes the adult says that they didn't do anything wrong, that it's true love and that people just don't understand," Shoop said. "The female or the male who quote 'falls in love' with a child doesn't have an understanding that they're actually raping and exploiting this child."

In this case coming out of Nebraska regarding 25-year-old school teacher, Kelsey Peterson and her alleged criminal sexual relationship with a 13-year-old former student from Mexico, it is becoming evident that there are more adults who have been placed in charge of our children's safety who need to be held accountable for their actions, or lack there of. There is an ongoing pattern of school administrators, principals, and superintendents who either ignore or even cover up criminal behavior by teachers against students. Acting as though it is up to their discretion as to whether punishment beyond the walls of the school grounds is in order.

Experts who study sexual misconduct by teachers says district officials should have seen a bad situation when they first fielded complaints, and done more.

"If a school district has reason to give warning, you conduct an investigation," said Robert Shoop, director of Kansas State University's Cargill Center for Ethical Leadership. "You don't just say 'Be a good person,' and then go about your business as if nothing has ever happened. You have to pay attention to what's going on."

Wayne Promisel, a retired Virginia detective who has investigated many sex abuse cases, said if the district had enough reason to put Peterson on administrative leave and start an investigation, it should have called police before calling the teacher.

"If you're that committed to realize that you think there's something afoot, that's when you ... call in the locals to bring objectivity to it," Promisel said. "Law enforcement is there 24/7, 365 and they don't turn away complaints, especially when kids are involved."

The case comes at a time when lawmakers and governors in seven states and Congress are expressing renewed interest in the issue of sexual misconduct by teachers following an investigation by the AP that concluded last month.

The AP found that states took action against the licenses of 2,570 educators from 2001 through 2005 following allegations of sexual misbehavior, and that investigators and academics who study the problem believe it is badly underreported. There are about 3 million public school teachers nationwide.

Teaching America

2007-11-09T10:38:00.000-08:00

Article by William J. Bennett on National Review Online

These are tough times for, and in, America. We are at war, and we find that war highly controversial. Many of our political leaders have record-low approval ratings and too many are held in ignominy. Washington — our nation’s capital — is held in contempt, as a laugh line by comedians. But perhaps a greater tragedy than all of this is that we seem to no longer have any kind of reference point. For indeed, we are not living in the toughest of times, we are not living in the worst of times, nor are we fighting the toughest of wars. But try telling that to our nation’s young people; too many of them absorb too much of the negativism taught by our culture to know this.

The truth is, we’ve been in far worse shape in terms of what we’ve had to endure in this country — but we may not have been in far worse shape in terms of what we know about our country. Too many of our high-school students do not graduate high school, and of those who do, too many do not know the basic facts of their own country’s history.

This year’s National Assessment of Education Progress (our “Nation’s Report Card”) revealed that over 50-percent of our nation’s high-school students — our population reaching voting age — are functionally illiterate in their knowledge of U.S. History. Tragically, students do not begin their education careers in ignorance: if you track education progress in the 4th, 8th, and 12th grades with the Nation’s Report Card, you will see students know more in the 4th grade, less in the 8th grade, and are failing by the time they are high-school seniors. Relative to what they should know at their grade level, the longer they live and grow up in America, the less they know about it. How did this happen? Why is knowledge of and about the greatest political story ever told so dim?

I think that William J. Bennett's America: The Last Best Hope is going om my Christmas list this year.

William J. Bennett is also the author of The Children's Book of Virtues.

Former Substitute Teacher Accused of Having Sex With Teenage Student to Go to Trial

2007-11-08T13:57:00.000-08:00

Update on the story I blogged on back on October 8, 2007 regarding a Pierce County, WI teacher was posted at WEAU - HomePage.

A former Prescott substitute teacher was fired. Now, she faces felony charges for having sex with a 13-year old student.

A Pierce County judge ruled the case will go to trial.

Thirty-nine-year-old Anne Knopf is charged with felony sexual assault of a child under the age of 16.

Anne Knopf isn't in jail. The judge released her on a $25,000 signature bond. Monday, she was fingerprinted and jailers took her mug shot at the Pierce County Sheriff's Department. The judge says she cannot have any contact with the boy or his family.

"We take these cases very seriously, the potential penalty is very serious," said Pierce County District Attorney John O'Boyle. "But this case is still in its infant stages, with the preliminary hearing down the road. There's nothing to prove guilt yet."

"It's really not the time to make any comments about the allegations," said Knopf's defense attorney Fred Bruno.

Knopf is accused of having sex with a 13-year-old male student, between January 1 and May 18 of this year.

I stated then that the superintendent's investigation was not sufficient and that further digging needs to be done. If anything has been done, I have seen no evidence of it.

As a matter of fact, this bit from the Prescott Journal might explain why...

Prescott Superintendent Roger Hulne stated that his own investigation found nothing inappropriate to have occurred on school property or during school hours.

However, one account in the sheriff's investigation stated that Lyle Nolt, the middle school principal, was notified three weeks prior to the May 17 incident of rumors and suspicions about some type of relationship between the boy and Knopf.

Nolt at first refused to confirm he was notified and did not comment on whether any action was taken regarding that complaint.

Nolt later submitted a letter last Tuesday responding to the Journal, stating that the mother of the boy had told him approximately three weeks before May 17 that her son was receiving e-mails from a person named Mara. In his letter, Nolt said he told the student's mother he didn't know anyone named Mara and advised her to continue to intercept the e-mails and to report them to police if she felt her son was in danger.

In a follow-up interview, Nolt stated that he did not know that Knopf was the subject of the mother's complaint until he was notified by Hulne on May 18.

Nolt stated that he did not take any further action or pursue an investigation based on the mother's complaint.

I wonder why she went to the school superintendent if she had no reason to believe that it was a teacher that he was emailing?

(AP) Romney Wants Tax Help for Home Schooling

2007-11-08T05:25:00.000-08:00

Posted at WKRN.COM

Parents who home school their children should get a tax credit to help offset the expense of teaching, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said Wednesday.

"I also believe parents who are teaching their kids at home, homeschoolers, deserve a break, and I've asked for a tax credit to help parents in their homes with the cost of being an at-home teacher," he said.

Romney supports giving parents more educational options, through charter schools or vouchers, but he said legislation should be done on a state level.

"I really hesitate to have the federal government become too involved in local schools," he said.

Taxes for schools are collected at the state or district level and should be legislated as such. Thanks for the support though, Mitt.

Colorado Coach Allegedly Hit Boys in Groin With Basketballs

2007-11-06T10:04:00.000-08:00

Excerpted from FOXNews.com

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — A former high school basketball coach on trial on allegations of hitting players in the groin with basketballs, a clipboard and other objects took the stand Monday and called himself a fun-loving coach and that some players were lying.

Gregory Lynn Burr, 29, is charged with sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust and other counts. He is accused of hitting nine 14- to 16-year-old boys during the 2005-06 season at Monument Academy, a charter school in the Lewis-Palmer district.

Burr, smiling and laughing as he recalled some of the incidents, recalled four incidents in which he said he hit players in the groin accidentally.

4 times in one year? I can't recall 4 times in my life where I hit someone in the groin accidentally. This seems very suspicious.

Prosecutor Nan Scranton has said that one boy had to have surgery after he was hit several times in the groin.

A former player testified that a teammate writhed in agony for 15 minutes after Burr threw a tennis ball that struck him in the groin.

Oh yeah, really funny. If this is true, then this is juvenile bullying in the very least, and criminal assault to boot.

Teen Hires Hitman to Kill Parents After Being Grounded From PlayStation, Television

2007-11-06T05:51:00.000-08:00

Posted on FOXNews.com

How important has TV and video games become to your child? More important than you, his parents?

WASHINGTON — Like many middle-class, suburban American parents, Shannan and Joey Troiano worried about their son’s behaviour and his bad grades at high school. And like many wayward teenagers, Cory Ryder was grounded for weeks at a time, had a PlayStation confiscated and was banned from watching TV.

Less typically, this 16-year-old was plotting to murder his parents by hiring a hitman, while his mother was organising a sting operation involving a police officer posing as a contract killer.

Cory’s trial is scheduled to begin today at the circuit court in St Mary’s County, Maryland. His mother is expected to testify as a witness for the prosecution.

At an earlier court hearing Mrs Troiano, 35, explained how her emotions were torn between being an agonised mother and a murder victim. “I miss him being at home,” she said, “and I miss us joking around and kidding around. And then in the very same breath – I don’t know what this kid will do, because it’s not my son. That can’t be my little boy sitting there.”

California School District to Vote Whether 'In God We Trust' Belongs In Classroom

2007-11-06T05:31:00.000-08:00

UPDATE: California School District Approves "In God We Trust" Classroom Displays

Thank God we haven't lost all sensibility in this country.
FOXNews.com

I don't see why there should even be a question. How can you teach American history without "In God We Trust" and the U.S. Constitution, or the Declaration of Independence?

Trustees of a school district in Bakersfield, Calif., will decide Monday night whether to allow posters bearing the nation's motto — "In God We Trust" — and other historical documents to be displayed in classrooms.

The display of posters of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights will also be voted on Monday night.

Kern County High School District trustee Chad Vegas initially proposed the measure as a way of promoting patriotism. But the idea has sparked a contentious debate.

Board President Bob Hampton, a former teacher in the district, told The L.A. Times that he'll vote against the posters because they reflect a "spiritual agenda."

"The spiritual side of students belongs at home and at church, not in the educational system," Hampton said.

The classroom displays were first suggested by the non-profit group In God We Trust — America Inc., whose president is Jacquie Sullivan, a Bakersfield councilwoman.

Sullivan told FOXNews.com that she expects the measure to pass with the necessary 3 to 5 majority of trustees voting in favor, but said the issue would likely be over how many classrooms should carry the displays.

"I encouraged the trustees to put this on the agenda," she said. "It's very important. We need to promote patriotism and promote it in our schools. We can’t just assume that the younger generations are going to have that strong love for God and their country the way the older generations do."

Conservatives to Calif. parents: Leave K-12 public schools

2007-11-05T11:56:00.000-08:00

Posted at OneNewsNow.com

A California pro-family leader and his organization are making the blunt pronouncement that because of two new laws signed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger last month, it's time for parents and their children in the Golden State to exit the public school system.

"It's time to exit the public schools because your children will be sexually indoctrinated if you leave them there," warns Randy Thomasson of Campaign for Children and Families (CCF). The pro-family leader says that that indoctrination will include kindergarten-age children because of the new laws scheduled to go into effect at the beginning of January 2008. SB 777 requires all school instruction and activities to include positive promotion of homosexuality and cross-genders; and AB 394 enforces the positive attitudes through anti-harassment training for students, teachers, and parents.

Karen England, executive director of pro-family lobby Capitol Resource Institute, agrees that it might be time to go, despite her group's current last-minute efforts to gather petition signatures for placing the matter on a state ballot referendum. "Yes," she admits. "I would be very frightened if my kids were in public school in California after the passage of SB 777."

Thomasson warns parents must sacrifice to protect their children from the schools, and that private and home schools will be their only sanctuary -- so they must believe they can overcome obstacles to do either one.

"If you love your children, and [if] you have a will -- and God gave everybody a strong will -- you can home school ... and you can learn along the way," he counsels. "There are books and curriculum to help you. And you can afford private school if you sacrifice other 'wants' and replace the 'wants' with 'needs,' and [if] you financially adjust." CCF is assisting parents from its website with links to information on how to find funds to pay for private schools or home-schooling material.

According to Thomasson, there is no "opt-out" for families or school districts to any of the homosexual "anti-harassment" laws that will go into effect in all public K-12 schools next year.

What will it take before you realize that you may be losing your child if you send them to public school? Its one thing to say your going to fight the system. However, its another thing to leave your child in harm's way while you do.

School health centers didn't report underage sex

2007-11-05T06:48:00.000-08:00

Posted at the Portland Press Herald.

Portland's school-based health centers have not been reporting all illegal sexual activity involving minors as required by law, but they will from now on, city officials said Thursday.
Cumberland County District Attorney Stephanie Anderson questioned the health centers' reporting practices after the Portland School Committee decided last week to offer prescription birth control at the King Middle School health center.

The King Student Health Center has offered comprehensive reproductive health care, including providing condoms and testing for sexually transmitted diseases, since it opened in 2000. The school serves students in grades 6 to 8, ages 11 to 15.

Maine law prohibits having sex with a person under age 14, regardless of the age of the other person involved, Anderson said.

A health care provider must report all known or suspected cases of sex with minors age 13 and under to the state Department of Health and Human Services, she said. Abuse also must be reported to the appropriate district attorney's office, Anderson said, when the suspected perpetrator is someone other than the minor's parent or guardian.

"When it's somebody under age 14, it is a crime and it must be reported," Anderson said. "The health care provider has no discretion in the matter. It's up to the district attorney to decide."

I'm completely disgusted at people who think that they simply know better then everyone else and then proceed to use this divinely imparted knowledge to defy the law and cover up child abuse. Schools and faculty that have defied the law regarding reporting underage sex deserve to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. That is the only way that we can begin to reduce these occurrences and hopefully deter others from trying the same.

States Vow Crackdowns On Teacher Sex Abuse

2007-11-05T06:43:00.000-08:00

Posted at States TheLedger.com

Looks like some good news is coming out the recent AP report regarding sexual abuse in America's schools.

The state government would open its now-secret books on teacher sexual misconduct in Maine.

Missouri school districts would be barred from backroom deals that let misbehaving teachers quietly move on.

New York would be able to swiftly remove convicted teachers' licenses.

Across the country, governors, legislative leaders and top education officials are pledging to close loopholes that have allowed teacher sexual misconduct to persist. In Congress, legislation that targets such misbehavior has gathered more sponsors.

However, not everyone is so eager to get on the bandwagon.

In Minnesota, Karen Ballmer, executive director of the Board of Teaching, said requiring each district to check with the state before hiring a new teacher could become a logistical problem at certain times of the year, when districts are doing a lot of hiring.

In Missouri, the state School Boards' Association raised doubts about an across-the-board ban on confidentiality agreements.

"Sometimes, there are good reasons a school board might have for confidentiality agreements," said association spokesman Brent Ghan. "Some protect the identity of students. Some protect the districts from costly litigation, saving taxpayer dollars."

Keep digging. I'm sure there's a good excuse for allowing predators to have unrestricted access to our children in there somewhere...

Parents are the Problem

2007-11-05T06:34:00.000-08:00

Excerpted from Virtual Reality, a blog at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

When someone has an agenda, and you don't support that agenda, that person with the agenda will see you as an obsticle and try to remove you from their path. Evidently, the DPI and WEAC see parents as an obsticle when it comes to educating your children. Is it safe to assume that they have an agenda?

On Tuesday of this week, in a Waukesha courtroom, the state governmental agency responsible for our public schools and a labor union came before the Wisconsin Court of Appeals and pleaded with the judges to keep parents out of public schools.

Yes, that's right. The state and the teachers union are at war with parents and I'm mad as heck about it. (Madder than heck, actually, but trying to keep this blog family friendly).

According to the Department of Public Instruction and the state teachers' union, parents are the problem. And these bureaucracies know just how to fix it. They want to keep parents, and indeed anyone without a teaching license, out of Wisconsin public schools.

Of course WEAC, the state teachers' union, likes that idea. Licenses mean dues. Dues mean power.

DPI likes it because ........well, could it be just because WEAC does?

The lawsuit before the Court of Appeals was filed by WEAC in 2004 in an effort to close a charter school that uses an on-line individualized curriculum allowing students from all over the state to study from home under the supervision of state certified faculty. The school is the Wisconsin Virtual Academy (WIVA). The Northern Ozaukee School District took the bold step of opening this new kind of school in the fall of 2003 after DPI approved their charter. Hundreds of families around the state enrolled their children under open enrollment that first year and mine was one of them. WIVA has grown every year since and this year has more than 800 students.

In January of 2004, WEAC filed their lawsuit against the school and DPI who authorized its existence. Later that year in a stunning reversal DPI switched sides and moved to close its own public school. DPI alleges that parents are too involved in their own children's
education.

That's right. They argue parents are too involved.

I've always thought parental involvement in a child's education was a good thing. What do I know? I don't have a teacher's license.

DPI says they don't know how much parental involvement is too much, but they say they know I and the other parents at WIVA are too involved. Too involved? DPI has refused to propose any rules for on-line schools to follow. They are a regulatory agency and that's their job, but they have gone to the courts instead. They have asked the courts to write the rules and they've told the courts that parents have no business being so involved in the public education of their children.

US kids get new trend: more active parents | csmonitor.com

2007-11-02T05:36:00.000-07:00

Posted at the Christian Science Monitor is some good news. I pray that this is an encouragement to you to spend more time with your children and to take more interest in what they do. We're moving in the right direction.

Every evening, Dan and Cheryl Weese and their three kids sit around the dinner table together and talk about their day.

Television is no distraction: The family's TV has been in the basement for six years.

"We don't miss it," says Mr. Weese, a Chicago architect. He and his wife, who also works, made a decision when their first son was born to "challenge ourselves to be more involved" with their kids. Ditching TV, eating breakfast and dinner together, and regularly reading to their 7-year-old son and 4-year-old twins are all part of that decision.

The Weeses may still be unusual among US families, but more parents are moving in their direction, according to new Census data released Wednesday. Among other things, parents are reading more to their children and placing more restrictions on their television viewing than they did 10 years earlier. Nine percent more children are taking classes outside school, and 5 percent fewer 12- to 17-year-olds had to repeat a grade.

"It appears parents are more involved with their kids than they were 10 years ago," says Jane Dye, a family demographer with the US Census Bureau who helped compile the data, which was based on the 2004 Survey of Income and Program Participation.

The news may seem startling to those accustomed to headlines about kids glued to the TV, but experts say the Census data confirm a trend of more protective, involved parenting that has been going on for some time. "This generation of parents is monitoring their children more diligently than generations in the past," says Ruby Takanishi, president of the Foundation for Child Development, which publishes an annual Child Well-Being Index. The Census data is based on self-reporting, she notes, and it's impossible to know whether people tell the truth. "But they're certainly reporting what they think should be the truth."

Also, some aspects of the report could be misleading, Ms. Takanishi says. Take, for example, the news that significantly more parents are placing restrictions on on TV. "Children aren't watching television because they're playing with video games," she says.

But the data also found increases in the percentage of children who are read to at least seven times a week – from 48 percent to 53 percent of children aged 1 to 2 – and there were increases for children both below and above the poverty line.

Ohio education department launches online database of disciplined teachers

2007-11-02T05:33:00.000-07:00

Public shame goes a long way towards deterring bad behavior.

Posted at The Columbus Dispatch.

Superintendents and parents now can learn if a teacher has been disciplined for misconduct by the state.

The Ohio Department of Education this morning launched an online database that contains the names of every teacher, coach, administrator and licensed employee who has been punished since 1999.

It does not provide any information on unfounded allegations or educators currently under investigation by the Office of Professional Conduct.

But in the cases where state officials have confirmed misconduct and taken action, the database lists the school district where the educator worked and a basic description of the wrongdoing such as, “conviction for sexual battery” or “inappropriate relationship with a student.”

“In general, we support a statewide database,'' said Michelle Prater, spokeswoman for the Ohio Education Association. “But until we see it, I can't begin to comment.''

Superintendents also consider such a database another tool to help weed out teachers with questionable histories.

“It's a significant step in the direction of assuring school district personnel have clean records,'' said David Laurenzi, president of the Buckeye Assocation of School Administrators and superintendent of Independence schools in Cuyahoga County. “It will help make classrooms safer.''

At least 10 other states, including Kentucky and Michigan, post disciplinary cases online.

The online database comes on the heels of a 10-month Dispatch investigation that exposed flaws in the teacher-discipline system. One was that the state Education Department did not always notify school districts about reprimanded teachers, so some superintendents had unknowingly hired teachers with histories of misconduct.

The department also removed the shroud of secrecy surrounding some cases. Until now, the state hid the reason for some revocations because the teachers' misconduct was reported by a child-protection agency. Now, the public can read a basic description of the offense on the database.

The Department of Education database

Attorney says sexual abuse in schools is epidemic

2007-11-01T11:48:00.000-07:00

Excerpted from OneNewsNow.com

In regards to a recent investigation by the Associated Press, a Santa Barbara, California-based attorney who investigates abuse and misconduct in schools believes that sexual abuse in American public schools is an "epidemic" and that it is largely ignored.

Mary Jo McGrath is a Santa Barbara, California-based attorney who investigates abuse and misconduct in schools, and conducts seminars to teach schools and parents how to recognize the signs that abuse may be taking place. McGrath says there are 17,500 school districts in the U.S. -- and she estimates that with the staggering number of sexual abuse cases being reported, it averages about one perpetrator per school.

According to the attorney, the problem is largely ignored because society as a whole does not want to confront something so repulsive.

"If you look at where the sexual abuse is most prevalent, it's in the home -- and we don't want to deal with that. It's just a topic that's so repulsive to us that we shut down," she says. "The same phenomenon takes place in schools. We cannot believe that the person with the friendly smile who we see in the supermarket and may even go to church with -- [we can't believe] that teacher is also an abuser."

McGrath says most abusers are not shadowy figures lurking in dark corners, but often are friendly, well-liked members of the community. AP's investigation bears that out, noting that the perpetrators it found included teachers, school psychologists, principals, and superintendents who are often popular, recognized for excellence, and (in almost 90 percent of the cases) male.

She said "it averages about one perpetrator per school". If averages are correct, and you claim that there is not a perpetrator in your school, then there are more than 1 in another school.

ADF: 7th Circuit reverses ruling prohibiting use of Jesus’ name in Indiana legislative prayers

2007-11-01T06:13:00.000-07:00

Finally, a voice of reason from a circuit court.

Posted at the Alliance Defense Fund.

INDIANAPOLIS — The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit Tuesday reversed a ruling prohibiting invocations in the name of Jesus during the opening of Indiana legislative sessions. The Alliance Defense Fund and the Family Research Council filed a friend-of-the-court brief to the 7th Circuit.

“The custom of our Founding Fathers to open meetings with prayer continues to this day. Those who oppose Christian invocations are essentially saying that the Founders were violating the Constitution as they were writing it,” said ADF Senior Counsel Glen Lavy. “People of all religions have always had an equal opportunity to offer prayer before Indiana legislative sessions.”

Representatives in the Indiana House nominate religious leaders of various faiths to speak by submitting a “Minister of the Day” form, which specifies the individual’s availability. Although persons identifying themselves as representing a Christian church offered most of the prayers during the 2005 legislative session, a Muslim imam, a Jewish rabbi, a layperson, and some of the legislators themselves also offered prayers.

A federal judge ruled in favor of four Indiana citizens who brought a suit against Indiana House Speaker Brian Bosma in 2005. The four, represented by the Indiana branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, objected to the Christian prayers. In his ruling, U.S. District Court Judge David F. Hamilton stated that future invocations in the Indiana legislature must be “non-sectarian.”

"And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved."
- Act 4:12

"Blessed is he who does not take offense at Me."
- Luk 7:23

5th Circuit upholds parental rights victory for Texas teacher

2007-10-30T06:10:00.000-07:00

Posted at theAlliance Defense Fund.

Teacher represented by ADF ally denied promotion after declining
to move her children from private religious school to public school

NEW ORLEANS — The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit has again upheld a district court’s decision in favor of a Texas public school teacher.

Tuesday, the court affirmed a jury verdict which found a school superintendent violated Karen Jo Barrow’s constitutional rights when Barrow was denied a position as vice principal after refusing to transfer her own children from a private, religious school to a public school. The Alliance Defense Fund provided funding to Liberty Legal Institute, which represents the teacher.

“Parental rights do not become null and void just because the parent is a teacher. The decision of whether or not to consider an employee for a job should never be based on where the applicant chooses to educate her own children. Neither the state nor any school official has the right to dictate how an employee’s child should be raised,” said ADF-allied attorney Kelly Shackelford, president of Liberty Legal Institute.

Who better than a teacher to know that they would rather not send their children to government school?

Court Allows Ill. Moment of Silence

2007-10-30T06:07:00.000-07:00

Excerpted from The Associated Press.

CHICAGO (AP) -- A federal judge refused Monday to temporarily bar schools from observing a brief period of prayer or reflective silence for students, but he allowed a lawsuit contesting the practice to move forward.

U.S. District Judge Robert W. Gettleman told talk-radio host Rob Sherman, who filed the suit, and attorneys for school District 214 and the state to come back to court on Nov. 14 to explore the issue further.

Sherman's 14-year-old daughter, Dawn, is a student in the district at Buffalo Grove High School. She and her father maintain that the new law is just another round in the long-running battle over prayer in school and as such violates the U.S. Constitution.

"The whole purpose of this law is to get religion into the public schools," Rob Sherman told reporters as he left the courthouse.

The Silent Reflection and Student Prayer Act already had allowed Illinois schools to have a moment of silence at the start of every school day if they wished to do so. Legislators, overriding a veto by Gov. Rod Blagojevich's veto this month, voted to make the observances mandatory.

School district representatives told the judge that they would enforce the law in neutral fashion with a 15-second moment of silence that made no reference to religion.

Sherman is an outspoken atheist who has gone to court before in an effort to get religious symbols out of the public sphere.

Quick refresher course... Here's what the U.S. Constitution actually says regarding religion and state.

Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

The Constitution prohibits Congress from making laws respecting an establishment of religion [and] prohibiting the free exercise thereof. To not allow a moment of silence would prohibit the free exercise of one's own religion. Maybe atheists don't believe in silence either.

Teacher Misconduct Ignored

2007-10-30T05:36:00.000-07:00

Excerpted from Teacher Magazine.

State lawmakers are demanding changes to rid classrooms of teachers with histories of sexual misbehavior, but for years the Legislature failed to repair educators' discipline system, a newspaper reported Sunday.

The Ohio Department of Education repeatedly asked for laws that would require criminal background checks and force districts to report misconduct to the agency.

Lawmakers also denied victims of decades-old child sex abuse the chance to file civil lawsuits against their abusers. One consequence is that offenders at private schools have been able to keep their violations hidden because those records are not public. The legislation could have helped identify teachers who preyed on students.

Lawmakers recently watered down a law that would have required children-services agencies to report all cases of abuse and neglect by licensed educators to the state's Department of Education. The law now requires reporting only when the abuse "directly relates to a licensee's duties and responsibilities."

Speaker Jon Husted called the House Education Committee hearings that were held last week to investigate flaws in the teacher-discipline system.

"It was my understanding that the laws on the books were sufficient to handle this. If they're not now, we'll make sure they are," said Husted, a suburban Dayton Republican.

The Ohio Department of Education is the only agency that can suspend or revoke an educator's license.

The Legislature has given in to pressure from teachers unions and lobbying by school administrators, said Mark Haverkos, a parent from West Chester Township in Butler County. He testified before a House committee last week.

"They've got to move parents up on the priority list," Haverkos said. "The system is gamed against us."

As this article points out, teacher's unions and and school administrators seem to consistently position themselves on the side against our children. They lobby for laws that protect those who wish to work around our children for the purpose of serving their perverted sexual desires.

Lawmakers are no better when they cave in to teacher's unions for the almighty dollar. Lawmakers tend to forget that it isn't money that gets them elected, its people. Parents, if you're going to continually entrust the care of your children to others, you absolutely need to stand up and insist that those who provide that care and those who make the laws that regulate them are putting the well being of the children first and foremost. If we don't do this collectively, we have no power.

Children remain unprotected

2007-10-23T06:36:00.000-07:00

Excerpted from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Every school has rules governing teacher behavior. Every state has laws against child abuse, and many specifically prohibit teachers from taking sexual liberties with students. Every school district has administrators who watch out for sexual misconduct by teachers.

Yet people such as Chad Maughan stay in the classroom.

Maughan got in trouble twice for viewing pornography at schools in Washington state but was allowed to keep teaching. Within two years, he was convicted of raping a 14-year-old girl in his school.

Legal loopholes, fear of lawsuits and inattention have weakened the safeguards that are supposed to protect children in school. The system fails hundreds of kids each year, an Associated Press investigation found. It undoubtedly fails many more whose offenders go free.

Read the entire article to see where priorities truly lie when it comes to protecting our children.

... piecemeal efforts have often run into resistance - from lawmakers reluctant to tackle the subject, from teachers unions concerned with privacy and due process, and from school boards worried about court fights.

Any lawmaker, union, school board, or other organization that puts the protection of perpetrators above the children should be considered an enemy of the people. An enemy of our children. That includes churches if they come down on the side of protecting adults from embarrassment at the expense of the child victims.

In Minnesota, the state school board association - allied with two church groups - has lobbied against a bill that would give victims of child sex abuse more time to bring civil claims. Schools, like churches, could be held liable if they failed to stop abuse about which they should have known.

It's a sad state that we are in when schools are more afraid of lawsuits and embarrassment than they are of allowing children to be permanently harmed by those who have been put in place to protect them and to teach them.

ADF attorneys reach settlement with N.Y. school district affirming student’s constitutional right to express pro-life view

2007-10-23T05:39:00.000-07:00

Posted at the Alliance Defense Fund - Defending Our First Liberty.

ADAMS, N.Y. — Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund have reached a settlement with South Jefferson Central School District officials who had censored a New York high school senior’s pro-life message during the Pro-Life Day of Silent Solidarity. The Pro-Life Day of Silent Solidarity, sponsored by Stand True Ministries (www.standtrue.com), is a student-led event giving students an opportunity to educate their classmates about the dangers of abortion.

“We’re glad that school officials will no longer treat pro-life expression as second-class speech,” said ADF Legal Counsel Matt Bowman. “Students do not forsake their constitutional rights once they pass through the schoolhouse door. School officials have done the right thing by reaching this settlement and establishing a new policy which affirms the free speech rights of its students.”

On Oct. 24, Scott Fish and other students attempted to communicate a pro-life viewpoint to their classmates through the use of message-bearing T-shirts, armbands, leaflets, and symbolic expression. The school principal censored Fish and the other students because their message might make students feel “uncomfortable” and allegedly violated the so-called “separation of church and state.”

After ADF attorneys filed a federal lawsuit on Fish’s behalf, the school district promptly agreed to permit student speech through pro-life clothing and leafleting outside of class.

Freedom of speech applies to all. Its amazing how apparent the double standard is when it comes to who might be offended and whose feelings might be hurt.

Pro-Life Day of Silent Solidarity

2007-10-23T05:34:00.000-07:00

Pro-Life Day of Silent Solidarity
Since January 22, 1973 over 50,000,000 babies have had their voices silenced through surgical abortion in this nation alone.

Over 4,000 children have their lives taken each day in the name of choice.

Over 4,000 women are emotionally damaged every day.

On October 23, people from all over this nation will give up their voices for a day in solidarity for these children. Red arm bands and duct tape will identify them as taking part in the Pro-life Day of Silent Solidarity. They will carry fliers explaining why they are silent and educate others about the plight of the innocent children we are losing every day.

Are you willing to give up your voice for a day for those who will never have a voice?

Register Here - Registration is free, we just need to know how many people and schools are participating.

Sex-ed guidelines add homosexuality

2007-10-22T06:35:00.000-07:00

Posted at The Washington Times.

The D.C. State Board of Education has scheduled a December vote on proposed guidelines for sex-education classes that call for teaching students about homosexuality.

School officials have said they will hold a Nov. 28 hearing for members of the public to give their input on the proposed guidelines. The board is expected to vote on them Dec. 19 after a public comment period expires Nov. 30.

"You want the standards to also take into account the opinions, the expectations and the sound facts from the community," said John A. Stokes, a spokesman for the Office of the State Superintendent of Education.

The guidelines initially were contained in a 43-page draft document dated July 2 and titled "Health Learning Standards."

The guidelines say eighth-grade students should be taught the definition of sexual orientation "using correct terminology" and learn that some people "may begin to feel romantically and/or sexually attracted to people of a different gender and/or to people of the same gender."

They also say sixth-grade students should be taught that "people, regardless of biological sex, gender, ability, sexual orientation, gender identity and culture, have sexual feelings and the need for love, affection and physical intimacy."

Ninth-graders should be taught to "analyze trends in ... contraceptive practices and the availability of abortion," the guidelines stated.

School officials said the guidelines had to be revised because there were two separate versions of them.

Will they be taught to "analyze trends" in health problems related to homosexual activity? Never mind the extensive emotional and spiritual problems.

AP: Sexual Misconduct Plagues US Schools

2007-10-22T06:14:00.000-07:00

Posted at chicagotribune.com.

Students in America's schools are groped. They're raped. They're pursued, seduced and think they're in love.

An Associated Press investigation found more than 2,500 cases over five years in which educators were punished for actions from bizarre to sadistic.

There are 3 million public school teachers nationwide, most devoted to their work. Yet the number of abusive educators -- nearly three for every school day -- speaks to a much larger problem in a system that is stacked against victims.

Most of the abuse never gets reported. Those cases reported often end with no action. Cases investigated sometimes can't be proven, and many abusers have several victims.

And no one -- not the schools, not the courts, not the state or federal governments -- has found a surefire way to keep molesting teachers out of classrooms.

When you surrender you children to others to care for them, you not only loose control of what your children are taught, but also what they are subjected to. Ultimately, as I've said many times before, you are responsible for what your children are taught and subjected to. Unless you feel certain that your children are safe in the hands of those in whom you have entrusted them to, you are being careless. I realize that no one can remove all risk 100%, however as parents is there any reason why we should not try?

Prescribe 'the pill' at middle school?

2007-10-17T06:21:00.000-07:00

UPDATE 10/18/07:School Board Approves Birth Control Prescriptions at Maine Middle School

Pupils at a city middle school will be able to get birth control pills and patches at their student health center after the local school board approved the proposal Wednesday evening.

The plan, offered by city health officials, makes King Middle School the first middle school in Maine to make a full range of contraception available to students in grades 6 through 8, according to the state Department of Health and Human Services.

There are no national figures on how many middle schools, where most students range in age from 11 to 13, provide such services.

"It's very rare that middle schools do this," said Divya Mohan, a spokeswoman for the National Assembly on School-Based Health Care.

The Portland School Committee voted 5-2 for the measure.

Chairman John Coynie voted against it, saying he felt providing the birth control was a parental responsibility. The other no vote came from Ben Meiklejohn, who said the consent form does not clearly define the services being offered.

Opponents cited religious and health objections.

Diane Miller, who said she has worked as a school nurse in another district for eight years, called the proposal "tragic" and asked "What would God have us do?"

Excerpted from the Portland Press Herald.

Students who have parental permission to be treated at King Middle School's health center would be able to get birth control prescriptions under a proposal that the Portland School Committee will consider Wednesday.

The proposal would build on the King Student Health Center's practice of providing condoms as part of its reproductive health program since it opened in 2000, said Lisa Belanger, a nurse practitioner who oversees the city's student health centers.

If the committee approves the King proposal, it would be the first middle school in Maine to make a full range of contraception available to some students in grades 6 to 8, said Nancy Birkhimer, director of teen health programs for the Maine Department of Health and Human Services. Most middle schoolers are ages 11-13.

Although students must have written parental permission to be treated at Portland's school-based health centers, state law allows them to seek confidential health care and to decide whether to inform their parents about the services they receive, Belanger said.

So, in other words, if you give permission for your child to be treated for a cut or a scrape at the school health center, that 11 to 13 year-old child could also obtain birth control pills without having to notify you.

Don't leave educating our children to the government

2007-10-17T05:55:00.000-07:00

Excerpted from The Boston Globe.

"FREEDOM of education, being an essential of civil and religious liberty . . . must not be interfered with under any pretext whatever," the party's national platform declared. "We are opposed to state interference with parental rights and rights of conscience in the education of children as an infringement of the fundamental . . . doctrine that the largest individual liberty consistent with the rights of others insures the highest type of American citizenship and the best government."

That ringing endorsement of parental supremacy in education was adopted by the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1892, which just goes to show what was possible before the Democratic Party was taken hostage by the teachers unions. (Wondrous to relate, the platform also warned that "the tendency to centralize all power at the federal capital has become a menace," blasted barriers to free trade as "robbery of the great majority of the American people for the benefit of the few," and pledged "relentless opposition to the Republican policy of profligate expenditure.")

Today, on education as on so much else, the Democrats sing from a different hymnal. When the party's presidential candidates debated at Dartmouth College recently, they were asked about a controversial incident in Lexington, Mass., where a second-grade teacher, to the dismay of several parents, had read her young students a story celebrating same-sex marriage. Were the candidates "comfortable" with that?

"Yes, absolutely," former senator John Edwards promptly replied. "I want my children . . . to be exposed to all the information . . . even in second grade . . . because I don't want to impose my view. Nobody made me God. I don't get to decide on behalf of my family or my children. . . . I don't get to impose on them what it is that I believe is right." None of the other candidates disagreed, even though most of them say they oppose same-sex marriage.

Thus in a little over 100 years, the Democratic Party - and much of the Republican Party - has been transformed from a champion of "parental rights and rights of conscience in the education of children" to a party whose leaders believe that parents "don't get to impose" their views and values on what their kids are taught in school. Do American parents see anything wrong with that? Apparently not: The majority of them dutifully enroll their children in government-operated schools, where the only views and values permitted are the ones prescribed by the state.

But controversies like the one in Lexington are reminders that Big Brother's ideas about what and how children should be taught are not always those of mom and dad.

The key word here is trust since that's exactly what parents are doing. Most are clueless about what is actually being taught to their children both inside and outside of the classroom.

Teacher-Pupil Sex Across the World: How Much Is Homosexual?

2007-10-16T05:38:00.000-07:00

Abstract from the Empirical Journal of Same-Sex Sexual Behavior.

In news stories in English across the world for 1980-2006, 902 teachers engaged in sex with 3,457 pupils. Teachers engaging in same-sex sex constituted 63% of perpetrators in Ireland, 62% in New Zealand, 60% in Canada, 54% in Scotland, 48% in Australia, 47% in England, and 35% in the U.S.; in smaller samples, homosexuals accounted for 71% of perpetrators in mainland Europe, 26% in Africa, and 13% in Asia. Proportionately more same-sex sexual activity with pupils occurred in the West as compared to Asia and Africa.Most (54% of 810 male, 83% of 92 female) teachers violated only opposite sex pupils; 43% of perpetrators engaged in homosexuality; and 55% of victims were boys. Findings for each country or set of countries were consistent with U.S. studies based on superintendent report, principal report, self-report, and convictions indicating that a male homosexual is the most and a female heterosexual the least apt to have sex with pupils. (emphasis added)

Full report available at linked website.

The Media Assault on Abstinence Education

2007-10-15T06:07:00.000-07:00

Article posted at the Culture and Media Institute

The Left does not like abstinence education. And what the Left doesn’t like, the media don’t like either.

That’s why, despite ample evidence that abstaining from sex until marriage is one of the most responsible decisions a teenager or young adult can make, the media go out of their way to discredit abstinence programs. Over the past 11 months the media have attacked abstinence education repeatedly. “News” stories have concentrated on questionable information about the supposed failures of abstinence education programs while ignoring reliable data that support the programs.

The entertainment media have long promoted casual sex. A recent study by the Parents Television Council1 showed sexual content on broadcast prime time television increased 22 percent in the last six years. The ante was upped just recently. On September 30, CBS’s Cold Case featured Bible quoting teens in an abstinence club who turn out to be sexually active hypocrites. The club members try to keep their sins secret by stoning a girl to death. The episode also strongly suggests that abstinence-only education keeps kids ignorant about sexual issues, and committing to abstinence can even harm them. For example, the group’s leader later marries, but is unable to consummate her union.

If someone knows of media reports that actually support abstinence-only education, please let me know.

Prediction Now a Reality: Moms and Dads Banned in California Schools

2007-10-15T05:40:00.000-07:00

I guess I was wrong when I predicted that Gov. Schwartzeneggr would veto SB 777.

Excerpted from News With Views.

The terms "mom and dad" are now completely banned in California's school system and teachers are being ordered to use euphemisms for those terms. In addition, "husband and wife" are also banned under this new law signed by Gov. Schwarzenegger. The newly signed law also mandates public schools to allow boys to use girls restrooms and locker rooms, and vice versa, if they choose to do so.

"With this decision, Gov. Schwartzeneggr has told parents that their values are irrelevant," said Police Lieutenant Steve Rogers, former president of Cops for Christ.

"When are parents going to wake up and pull their children out of the public schools?" he asked rhetorically.

"This is the kind of activity that is replacing real teaching in government schools," claims a Northern New Jersey public school teacher and administrator who requested anonymity for fear of retribution from the Board of Education and the teachers' union officials.

"We [teachers] give the kids lunches, we teach them how to use condoms, we instruct them about sex including gay sex, we simulate Islam, and in our spare time we teach our pupils how to read and write," she said.

"More and more Americans are starting to wake up to find their country and its traditions being slowly torn down by those who worship at the altar of the politically-correct orthodoxy," claims political strategist Baker.

Unless all parents who oppose such measures begin to take some action against this kind of legislation, laws like this will continue to be passed across America. The activists who support it are not going to go away, and they are so very glad when those who oppose it do nothing but sit quietly.