Re: Challenges to teaching biology

Louise -- fair comments; I didn't spend much time looking, but I did expect
to find more. I didn't bother to ask around at advocacy groups like the
Rutherford Institute. That one be another place to find anecdotes. Maybe
overt bullying isn't so widespread as the anecdotes from my brother make it
seem to me. Or maybe it is and a few minutes of research won't turn it up;
or maybe there is perceived bias that is more subtle and perhaps in some
cases not fully intentional. A few other thoughts though:

Christian parents file complaints and lawsuits when their children are
asked to remove a cross necklace or a Jesus t-shirt, and when afterschool
Bible clubs are prohibited from
using school property. The media reports
on those stories. Are they less "sexy" than a teacher publically
humiliating a student?

One question that would have to be explored in more depth than we can do
here is the role of advocacy groups in this sort of litigation. We
certainly are a litigious society, which I know first-hand having spent many
years litigating court cases. But there are dynamics to what kinds of cases
get filed.

Litigation costs money. More accurately, litigation takes lots and lots of
lawyer time, and a lawyer's time is his or her money. If there is big money
to be made by a lawyer at the end of the day -- say, for example, in cases
where a pharmaceutical product allegedly causes bad side effects, like the
Vioxx cases -- lawyers will take those cases on contingency fees. The
individual plaintiff will not have to pay any lawyer fees; the fee is taken
out of the final settlement or recovery.

There is no big money in a case involving a kid who says his science teacher
is making fun of his religion. There's actually probably no money in it at
all. Contrary to popular perception, it's extremely difficult to recover
for "emotional distress" absent physical injury. And a case like this often
boils down to "he said / she said." A lawyer evaluating such a case is
faced with convincing a judge or jury to take a kid's word over a teacher's,
without any real prospect of recovering any kind of significant fee even if
the case is successful. So, if the lawyer takes the case at all, he or she
will charge an hourly rate of $200 or more. Few families will want to shell
out the tens of thousands of dollars it would cost to litigate such a
case. Therefore, relatively few cases of this sort are likely to be
brought.

This is in contrast to workplace harrassment cases, in which the damages
include back pay, benefits, and such. There are many reported cases of
religious workplace discrimination, because lawyers bring such cases
frequently on a contingency basis.

Enter the advocacy groups such as the Rutherford Institute. These are
groups with donor support that will step in and take on "religious liberty"
cases, not for the legal fees, but for social impact. But these groups are
looking for "impact" cases in areas where they believe they can change the
law or influence social policy. Therefore, they are likely to focus on
matters of general policy that apply accross an entire school, district or
state. These include things like school districts banning generally the
morning flagpole prayer, or refusing to let Muslim students use the
auditorium during the day for prayers. There's very little "he said / she
said" there -- it's often a matter of documented policy -- and if
successful, the case will set precedent concerning the policies other
districts may adopt. So, it's unlikely that such a group will spend its
budget on an individual harrassment allegation.

Again, all of this is anecdotal and contextual discussion. What a
well-designed survey would reveal, I'm not sure. Certainly there's a
perception of harassment among many American Evangelical parents. My guess
is that the whole story is far more complex than "good teachers / mean
students" or "mean teachers / good students" can convey.

I suggest that one reason (though not the only reason) people want
Christianity out of the
schools is because Christians have abused their power in the past.

I'm sure there's truth to this. I fully agree that there's blame to go
around.

I was also bullied a lot in this school.. not for being a Christian so such
as for being a
brainy goody two-shoes

I was bullied at public school sometimes too. Sometimes it was because I
was a Christian. I was branded a member of the "God Squad" -- and looking
back on who I was those many years ago, that probably was a fair brand! I
also was a big-mouthed wise guy sometimes, and got myself in trouble with
the "stoners" for making fun of them in public, which wasn't a good thing
given that I was skinny and short (still short; but unfortunately not skinny
any more!). And I wore pink Izod shirts with the collars turned up and had
a girlfriend whose knickname was "Muffy" (I was "Biff"). Oh well. High
school is hard no matter what.

But we should remember, I think, that Jesus and the Apostles Paul and James
told us very clearly that we should expect to be mocked and persecuted, and
that we should even rejoice in that. I worry sometimes that in our
legitimate desire to fix the damage caused by YEC, we go too far in the
other direction of accomodating our faith to the expectations of the world.
I've been subtely slighted for my faith in every context I've been in (like
the time at the law firm when a partner sidled up to the men's room urinal
next to me and said "So how's Jesus doing these days?" I was proud of my
reply: "Pretty much ruling the universe like he always has.") We can
always be more winsome and loving in how we live out our faith, but our
perfect example is that of Jesus, who was crucified, and our calling is to
take up his cross. It should come as no surprise that kids who seek to live
out their faith in public high schools will face opposition, and we need to
stand with and support them even as we work to foster better understanding
about faith and science issues.

On 4/4/06, Freeman, Louise Margaret <lfreeman@mbc.edu> wrote:
>
>
> > *What I still haven't seen (and I've looked) is a specific example:
> > Science
> > teacher X ridiculing Student Y for religious beliefs on date Z in
> > Public
> > School PDQ as reported by Whatitsname Press.*
> >
> > And you probably won't find that kind of thing. For one thing,
> > anti-religious bias often isn't that overt.
>
> The kind of ridicule you are descibing seems pretty overt to me
>
> >To a large extent,
> > religious
> > (particularly conservative Christian) parents aren't filing complaints
> > and
> > lawsuits, they're pulling their kids out of public school and
> > homeschooling
> > or sending them to private Christian schools. And, the press really
> > doesn't
> > care very much about it. The sexy issue is creationism and intelligent
> > design. That's what gets litigated and reported.
>
> Christian parents file complaints and lawsuits when their children are
asked to remove a
> cross necklace or a Jesus t-shirt, and when afterschool Bible clubs are
prohibited from
> using school property. They even threaten to sue schools that put on a
Christmas program
> that uses the tunes of familar carols with alternate lyrics (even when the
musical itself was
> authored by the music director in a conservative evangelical church!) The
media reports
> on those stories. Are they less "sexy" than a teacher publically
humiliating a student?
>
> > But just poking around for fifteen minutes or so, here's a blog post I
> > found
> > by someone (don't know the person at all) apparently advocating
> > homeschooling or private Christian schooling:
> > http://carla_rolfe.blogspot.com/2005/07/what-kids-are-not.html
> >
> > Note the anecdotal evidence the blogger provides:
> >
> >
> > "More and more I began to hear from other parents, that things had
> > changed,
> > in public schools. Things had changed for the worse. Aggression toward
> > certain kids was reaching new levels of criminal status, from the time
> > I was
> > in school. A Christian kid being mocked in
> > public highschool would have been considered an easy day. Things had
> > gone
> > from mocking, to lovely things like face slams into lockers -
> > destruction of
> > personal property, getting beat up behind the science labs, open
> > humiliation
> > from not only other kids, but teachers and staff as well. *Public,
> > classroom
> > mockery of creation, and a student's faith, right in front of the other
> > kids.*
>
> > Is this anecdotal hearsay evidence accurate? Probably partly yes,
> > partly
> > no. I'd love to see some serious social science research on this.
> > Wish I
> > had time to poke around in the literature.
>
> Maybe I'll suggest that to the next student I have looking for a thesis
topic. I poked a little
> bit, in several psychology and education databases, with some reasonably
obvious keyword
> combos like Bullying and Religious Discrimination. I found almost no
specific research; the
> few articles that mentioned religion tallked about it in a general context
as something to
> be included in anti-discrimination policies. Certainly nothing to indicate
that hostility
> towards Christians in pubic schools has increased over the last 15 years.
In contrast, there
> were a number of articles reporting widespread bullying of gay and lesbian
students.
>
> However, I can relate my own anecdotes... things I saw with my own eyes,
as opposed to
> hearing it from some unnamed parents. My fifth grade teacher used to beat
kid's hands
> with a yardstick for misbehavior during her mandatory teacher-led prayers
before lunch.
> This was over 10 years after the Supreme Court ruled such prayers
illegal. It also violated
> the school corporal punishment policy, which stated CP was to be used as a
last result,
> administered privately, in the presence of a witness, etc. etc. I also
remember this same
> teacher reducing a kid to tears by telling him he was going to the "bad
place" for telling a
> lie unless she prayed for him.
>
> This school also had weekly Bible classes taught primarily by the students
from the local
> SDA college; explicitly Christian, complete with prayers, Scripture
memorization... far
> more demanding than my Sunday School, now that I think about it (they
didn't grade you
> there, nor was Mrs. Criswell standing in the back of the room with her
yardstick.) I still
> have my report cards showing the grades I got in them. Parents were
allowed to opt out,
> but kids who didn't take them were sent to sit in the principal's office
for that period. I
> remember the lone Jewish boy in my class doing this for 5 years.
>
> I suggest that one reason (though not the only reason) people want
Christianity out of the
> schools is because Christians have abused their power in the past.
>
> I was also bullied a lot in this school.. not for being a Christian so
such as for being a
> brainy goody two-shoes. And if I dared complain about it I was told it was
my fault for
> letting the other kids pick on me.
>
> I see today how much *less* bullying is tolerated in my kid's public
school: no Bible
> reading, no prayer, no corporal punishment, but name-calling gets an
automatic note sent
> home to the parents and a single incident of hitting gets a kid sent to
the principal.
> Granted, my kids are only in elementary school, but my church friends with
kids in the
> high school seem equally satisfied with that environment.
>
> To quote Billy Joel: The good ole days weren't always good; tomorrow ain't
as bad as it
> seems...
>
>
>
>
>
>
Received on Tue Apr 4 11:10:03 2006