Parents to Demand Answers about Muslim Lesson at Lumberton ISD School Board Meeting March 7th, 2013 at 7pm. Before the meeting starts, anone can sign up to speak to the school board. This is In response to the High School lesson in Lumberton, Texas that made outrageous claims to the students such as terrorists should be called freedom fighters and Muslim Burqas are just a fashion statement instead of an oppressive object that, if not worn, could mean the death penalty for women in some countries. I am all about students learning other cultures, but this is told far. It is biased, offensive, and does not even show the truth about Muslim things like Burqas. The lesson might have had good intentions but what ended up happening was wrong. This lesson should be immediately suspended and an investigation made into the lesson and what needs to be changed to make sure these mistakes do not happen again.
In 2009 I approached John Valastro, who was Principle at the time, about teaching a religious course at Lumberton High School, but he refused to of...fer the course to the students. Earlier that year, Texas passed a law that stated if 10 or more students in a high school request for a religious course to be taught, then the school was to provide a religious course as an elective. I then spoke with many Lumberton High School students who expressed an interest in taking a class on world religions. I obtained a petition from over a hundred students requesting for a course to be taught and committing to take the course as an elective the next year. I presented this petition to John Valastro and he stated that he was not going to offer the class at the high school, even though the recent changes in Texas law required him to do so.
ReplyDeleteI attended Lumberton High School and had recently moved back to Texas after graduating from BIOLA University, a prominent Religious University in Los Angeles. I agree with John’s statement that “education and understanding” are better than “fear and ignorance”. However, this is not the position he took four years ago. John Valastro clearly owes the families of Lumberton, TX an explanation!