Saturday, May 23, 2009

Adventures in education!

First up...A new furor has erupted in one school and has been overblown by the media in an instructive case about the worldview of secular education. A school in Texas allowed the Gideons to place Bibles within reach of students. The horror!

Some parents in Frisco, Texas, are fuming because their public school district allowed Christian evangelists to provide Bibles to students on school grounds, which administrators say was done to stop even more proselytizing outside the schools.

Frisco Independent Schools allowed Gideons International to display Bibles on tabletops in all 13 of the district's middle and high schools last week. Officials say it didn't violate the law, but some parents say school is not the place to be offering the Good Book.
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The Gideons are now taking advantage of a school policy that allows them to leave Bibles on a tabletop in the schools' front offices, though they're barred from interacting with students or remaining there during school hours.

A spokeswoman for the school district said that a number of materials are made available to students this way, including newspapers, camp brochures and tutoring pamphlets. College and military recruitment information is available all year long. The Gideon Bibles were made available for just one day.

Do I think schools should be in the business of handing out Bibles or facilitating that happening? Not really even though in a place of "learning" the fact that the most important and accessible instrument of change and the development of Western Civilization is banned is telling.

What is most instructive is that in public schools, a couple of parents are outraged and it makes news when Bibles are left out among other literature. Other literature, as if the Word of God is a pamphlet. Yet those same schools can dispense advice on sexuality unimpeded to children and can provide them condoms and a wink without parental permission.

In another story, we see our progressive friends in California using a children's book about "gay penguins" to teach kids that homosexuality is just another lifestyle that they accept and embrace. No intereference from those pesky parents allowed of course!

A group of parents in a California school district say they are being bullied by school administrators into accepting a new curriculum that addresses bullying, respect and acceptance -- and that includes compulsory lessons about the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community that will be taught to children as young as 5 years old.
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The parents are also angry that they will not be allowed to keep their children out of the classes.

“I believe these children are far too young to be learning about what these issues mean,” said Alaina Stewart, who has three children who attend elementary school in Alameda. “These are adult issues and they are being thrust upon the children.”

But the school board says otherwise, and its attorneys say that if the curriculum is adopted, the parents will have no legal right to remove their children from class when the lessons are being taught.
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Among the course materials that could be added to the curriculum is "And Tango Makes Three," a children’s book about gay penguins struggling to create a family. The book has been banned in some areas of the country.

In response to the controversy surrounding the proposed curriculum, the school board has held two public debates this month.

One parent told FOXNews.com an “overwhelming” majority of parents spoke out against LGBT instruction at one of the meetings, but that public opinion had little impact.

Silly parents! Who cares what the taxpayers and the parents of these kids think? Don't you know that public school teachers are professionals and you should just do what they tell you. Just put little Suzie on the bus and we will take care of the rest!

Still, my wife was grilled by another mom, ostensibly a Christian at a Bible study breakfast and asked if she was concerned about "socialization". If this is the kind of socialization you get at school, you can keep it!

4 comments:

I am the Clay said...

I beleive the Bible should be allowed to be in Public Schools, along with other good books of literature. I mean if the a High School library has the Communist Manifesto by Marx, why not the bible? :)
I had heard about the problem in CA schools about the pro homosexual teaching going on and yet they cry out against the bible and prayer in school. What many parents may not realize , is humanism is a religion. They are teaching values and reshaping the children's minds in schools today. Another reason why I have chosen to homeschool my children.
God bless,
gloria

Unknown said...

I wish I could say that the pro-homosexual agenda was simply a California thing---but it has made its way (in force) to Northern Michigan----which is on the edge of human civilization (I can actually see the edge of the world from my living room window).

It isn't teaching pro-homosexuality that I mind so much (not that I am happy about it, but what more can we expect from public education?). What is highly troublesome is that this is mandatory. The parent is pushed to the sideline via governmental decree.

Arthur Sido said...

That is really the crux of it. It is not just homosexuality. There are any number of issues both major and minor that I may not agree with. It is that as a parent and a taxpayer, you have almost no say at all in what goes on. You are expected to turn your kids over to the schools and then keep your mouth shut. Your only input is a once a year "conference" for fifteen minutes and an obligation to support whatever tax increase is going to stave off education disaster that year.

Steve Martin said...

I believe public education is now a disaster for kids and for the country.

I really believe that kids would be better off not going to school at all.

Each day they are not in a public school is one day less of brainwashing.