praise the lord, they settled!matthew la clair, 17, of kearny, nj, fought back when his public school history teacher told his class that the students would go to hell if they didn't accept jesus christ. and that was only the beginning of his classroom religious rants. after matthew recorded one of these rants and passed it on to school administrators, his life did indeed become "hell"! he received a death threat and rage from his classmates. since the fall of 2006, matthew and his family have been pushing & struggling, & threatening to sue the district over this flagrant first amendment violation...
well, today, it's done. hallelujah! according to the new york times (may 10, 2007), "The settlement will include training for teachers and students about the separation of church and state and a public statement by the board praising Matthew for bringing the matter to its attention."
but what about the real life baptist pastor, whoops i mean, public school teacher mr. paszkiewicz? the settlement did not address anything as to his status... matthew changed his history class, but will training make mr. p change his "curriculum"? how can we ensure that he doesn't return to his classroom preaching during a history lesson?
for background info on this story and to hear matthew's recordings, see:
http://www.jewsonfirst.org/06d/kearny.html
3 comments:
good lord! i think I had heard something about this case, but no details. This is just incredible. and the teacher won't lose his job, the death threats won't be followed up on, and the spearation of church and state becomes a little grayer. at least the school finally faced up to it, sort of. after putting the poor kid through hell. Thank God there are people with the courage this guy had to record and report this type of abuse.
thank god? no pun intended. It begs the question too...why did they settle? What is the reason, if all they got was a declaration of bravery on the part of leclair. It is odd.
An epoch will come when people disclaim kinship with us as we disclaim kinship with the monkeys. -Kahlil Gibran, mystic, poet, and artist (1883-1931)
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