All schools shut down in Augusta County, Virginia, over Islam homework

[Teelie]

Extreme overreaction, paranoia, ignorance. Claims of propaganda. It's the 1950's all over again. Only instead of Red Russia trying to convery innocent children to communism it's now a homework assignment trying to convert children to Islam.

It's another Onion article only it isn't from the Onion. Some people really are this paranoid and this sensitive to their children learning anything about any non-Christian religion and convert to it. A homework assignment.

Ironically these very same people would not blink an eye and fight for the right to teach about Christianity in schools if the assignment were about that but someone objected to religious "indoctrination" in schools by some over-zealous Christian homework assignment.

I remember in my GeographySocial Studies class around 4th grade learning a little about Islam. We had a similar assignment to write out phrases in Arabic and some of the history of Islam and no one batted an eye thinking we'd all turn into Muslims.

Of course that was before it was suddenly a "threat" to worried parents who believe it only takes the slightest hint of another religion to turn their precious children into ISIS terrorists.

There are just so many things wrong with the school reaction too but given that some parents might actually cause harm in their "defense" of Christianity it's probably a good idea to shut down the schools before someone goes too far to "save the souls" of these children.

After a teacher at a Virginia school handed out a standard homework assignment on Islam, such an angry backlash flooded in that it prompted officials to close every single school in the county as a safety precaution.

"While there has been no specific threat of harm to students, schools and school offices will be closed Friday, December 18, 2015," Augusta County Schools said. Extracurricular activities were shut down Thursday afternoon.

And social media exploded over the school lesson -- a simple drawing assignment -- into a caustic discussion about religion and education.

Draw this

When the world geography class at Riverheads High School in Staunton rolled around to the subject of major world religions, homework on Islam asked students to copy religious calligraphy.

It read:

"Here is the shahada, the Islamic statement of faith, written in Arabic. In the space below, try copying it by hand. This should give you an idea of the artistic complexity of calligraphy."

The illustrative classical Arabic phrase was the basic statement in Islam. It translated to: "There is no god but Allah, and Mohammed is the messenger of Allah."

Angry calls

When students took it home, it was like a spark hitting a powder keg. Some of their parents saw the homework as an attempt to convert their children to Islam.

Calls and emails flooded the school. Some of them demanded the teacher be fired for assigning it.

Cheryl LaPorte had not designed the assignment herself, but took it from a standard workbook on world religions, local newspaper The News Leader reported.

LaPorte told The News Leader that now her job is to get her students through Standards of Learning tests.

No more shahada

The county school system reacted.

It removed the shahada from world religion instruction. "A different, non-religious sample of Arabic calligraphy will be used in the future," it said.

And it issued a statement saying no one was trying to convert anyone to any religion.

"Neither of these lessons, nor any other lessons in the world geography course, are an attempt at indoctrination to Islam or any other religion or a request for students to renounce their own faith or profess any belief," Augusta County Schools official Eric Bond said in a statement to CNN affiliate WHSV.

Not enough

But that hasn't been enough for Kimberly Herndon, who kept her ninth-grade son home from school.

"There was no trying about it. The sheet she gave out was pure doctrine in its origin," she told WHSV.

"I will not have my children sit under a woman who indoctrinates them with the Islam religion when I am a Christian," she said.

By Tuesday, like-minded parents and residents of the town of nearly 24,000 gathered in the sanctuary of Good Will Ministries to voice their grievances, including against the teacher.

At the same time, former students have taken to Facebook to defend her.

"I'm against anyone getting steamrolled by convoluted logic and I'm very pleased to see that there is so many people around me that feel the same way," a supporter wrote.

Security scramble

Back at the school, the sheriff and administrators had begun worrying about security.

On Monday, Augusta County issued a letter reassuring parents that schools in the county were safe. It did not refer to the homework assignment but did say that parents had become worried about security.

"All doors are locked with the exception of one front door. ... Faculty and staff monitor all activities inside and out of the buildings." Standard security procedures, the letter explained.

But as the week went on, officials got more specific about the source of concern -- calls and email messages -- and their target -- the world geography class.

"The school division began receiving voluminous phone calls and electronic mail locally and from outside the area," the school system said. And the "tone and content" were nasty.

The sheriff deployed more officers to county schools and began monitoring communications. Then all the schools in the county shut down.

Facebook arguments

The homework assignment in Staunton had ballooned into a national argument that was trending on Facebook.

Both sides dished out hard -- those who see the assignment as an affront to their religious beliefs and those who see it as a mind-broadening education assignment.

"This is so WRONG! There is only ONE GOD and HIS NAME is JESUS!" one user posted.

"You THINK ignorance is a GOOD thing!! Heaven forbid we should learn about other cultures when .03% of them are terrorists -- while more than 99% are good, honest, moral people," posted another.

As passions overflow, for fear of their potential effects, Augusta County Schools will remain shuttered over the weekend for all activities.

CNN

 

[Victarion]

I think the paranoia is directly correlated with the terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernadino. I don't see where religion has any place in curriculum, whatever religion it may be. None of that is important though. What's important is:

Our schools never got shut down over homework.

Free day FTW.

 

[Pink Ranger]

From what I hear about the assignment itself, I do not like or approve of it, but shutting down the entire school system for a whole day? What the hell for?

 

[Teelie]

There is a difference between teaching about religion and teaching religion. This is teaching about religion and not trying to indoctrinate anyone. It's also clear that if these children don't learn something about Islam and other religions in schools all they will grow up with is a very skewed, very wrong impression of other religions, especially Islam.

My GeographySocial Studies class also covered Christianity, Judiasm, Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, etc. and no one decided to convert to one. It was just an exploration of how other people in the world live their lives and you cannot exclude discussing religion in it. No one was preaching, no one was trying to convert or idolize any religion, not even Christianity.

And this is the best time to discuss Islam with those children and their parents because the more you let hate and intolerance fester the uglier and nastier the consequences will be down the line.

 

[PacificBoy]

The outage is really like an Onion piece coming to life. My question is whether the lesson also included the religious calligraphy of the other major religions, if it's a mini-study on comparative religion.

 

[Teelie]

I was thinking about that too which is what reminded me of my own far more tame experience learning of other religions as a grade schooler.

 

[Kar]

People are just ignorant. That's it. Probably didn't even care to understand what the lesson was about. Like Teelie said, nothing is wrong with learning ABOUT religion if it is related to the course. But moving forward, maybe teachers should send notes to parents letting them know or asking them is they have issues with their children learning about these sort of topics.

Poor kids.

 

[the_ultimate_evil]

ok maybe its just a uk thing but why the hell is geography teaching about religion. we never did that. we learned about countries, and geology etc

 

[Victarion]

World Geography if I had to guess.

 

[PacificBoy]

I was thinking about that too which is what reminded me of my own far more tame experience learning of other religions as a grade schooler.

I think we can all safely agree the degree of outrage here is ridiculous, but something can be said about the assignment itself, at least the small part of it shown in the news report. Based on that, it doesn't appear to be the best thought-out lesson plan. It's hard to say, though, without looking at the full homework.

 

[Teelie]

World Geography/Social Studies. It's been like 25 years so I was a bit fuzzy on the details. Back then they were kind of combined into one course/teacher.

 

[the_ultimate_evil]

World Geography/Social Studies. It's been like 25 years so I was a bit fuzzy on the details. Back then they were kind of combined into one course/teacher.

ahh fair dues. we had them as all separate subjects. geography, r.e, history etc

 

[Teelie]

I figure it's probably a bit relevant since I actually attended school in Virginia at the time I was in grade school so depending on how much has changed in the past 25~ years it might or might not be the same as it was then.

At the time I was in grade school my World Geography and Social Studies class was taught by the same teacher and he was former military although I can't remember what branch. Anyhow he had served time in Middle East and knew some of the culture from that area (again, not sure exactly what part of Middle East) and he was able to explain Islam and the culture of the area better than someone who had no knowledge of it.

He was respectful of all religions and did not try to "convert" anyone or any of that ridiculousness and there was some limited discussion on the different ways those people believed than we did.

It was informative but it was not indoctrination but without knowing who/how this homework assignment was administered I can't say it was anything like mine.

No one should be afraid to discuss religion in a educational setting so long as it does not turn into "my/this religion is better/worse" kind of situation. Education about other religions is not indoctrination.

I wonder how many of these parents and how many other Christians realize that Judiasm, Christianity and Islam are all siblings springing from the same source with different interpetations. They are not as far apart as the radical interpreters believe. Again, something I first learned in grade school.

 

[Teelie]

ahh fair dues. we had them as all separate subjects. geography, r.e, history etc

I may also be conflating two different grades. I had the same teacher two years in a row and he taught a variety of subjects in the geography and social studies area and history as well I think. Really had not thought about that in a long, long time.

 

[Kane52630]

It's the new Red Scare.

 

[Pink Ranger]

I'm sure these **** parents are happy at the actions they have caused, since they likely view education as a moral subversion anyway.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

ok maybe its just a uk thing but why the hell is geography teaching about religion. we never did that. we learned about countries, and geology etc

When I was in school religion was a part of the history department rather than geography, but this was decades ago.

 

[Victarion]

My memory of world geography is sketchy, but it was mostly geopolitics so there may have been some smatterings of local religion thrown in there.

 

[PemLam]

The reaction to the assignment was over the top, however, they could have selected any number of words or verses from the Koran or Islamic writings to get the desired outcome for the assignment. Hell, they could have just told the students to write lines from a Dr Suess book in Arabic...it didn't even have to be something from a religious text.

In this ridiculously PC world we live in where everyone thinks they're entitled to be offended by anything and everything they don't like, choosing that particular verse was bound to get a reaction. Had they used a similar Christian verse such as “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (Or any other; take your pick)! I truly believe there would have been someone complaining about that as well.

Leave it to today's society to make a mountain out of a molehill.

 

[Duran Man]

It's like an episode of South Park come to life.

 

[Victarion]

The latest in a trend, yes.

 

[Pink Ranger]

In this ridiculously PC world we live in where everyone thinks they're entitled to be offended by anything and everything they don't like, choosing that particular verse was bound to get a reaction. Had they used a similar Christian verse such as “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (Or any other; take your pick)! I truly believe there would have been someone complaining about that as well.

Leave it to today's society to make a mountain out of a molehill.

I guess the difference is that if some *****ey group of secular humanists squawked about a Jesus passage being used in a school lesson, the lesson would likely just get removed. They wouldn't shut down the school system for a day just to deal with all the threats.

 

[Steyin]

All this over what was essentially an art assignment.

 

[Pink Ranger]

Of course, none of these wholesome Americans whose threats have caused a school system to shut down will ever be charged, or labelled as terrorists. It's that whole "boys will be boys" attitude that applies to some people, but not to others.

 

[Breogan]

""Here is the shahada, the Islamic statement of faith, written in Arabic. In the space below, try copying it by hand. This should give you an idea of the artistic complexity of calligraphy."

The illustrative classical Arabic phrase was the basic statement in Islam. It translated to: "There is no god but Allah, and Mohammed is the messenger of Allah."

LOL @ religion.

If kids had been asked to write - "There is no god but Jesus" there'd have been complaints too.
Just the majority complaining would have mostly been ignored, accused of warring on christianity, and had to have crawled through some elaborate political process, to affect the change in the homework assignment.
While here a MAJORITY was able to shut it down quick.

In the end the assignment needs to be changed, and made a non religious text.

Like we love everyone, or one happy world, in all calligraphy of the world, then those still crying about it can go sulk.