Free Republic

MERIWETHER COUNTY, Ga. -A Meriwether County high school principal claims he was fired after he prayed with a group of students during a volunteer Christian meeting. Dr. Michael Lehr said he just wants the facts to come out and that he's relying on his faith to get him through this. News Radio 106.7's Nathalie Pozo spoke with several students and parents who are outraged this happened to what they call a kind, dedicated, well respected man. Now, the community is rallying behind him. “It is breaking our hearts its breaking our hearts… because it is not supposed to be like...

The nation’s leading pediatric group issued new guidelines this week saying that kids with lice should be allowed to stay in school. Many school districts ban students with lice from the classroom until the child has been treated and all the bugs and knits (or eggs) have been removed. Now the American Academy of Pediatrics is encouraging schools to change their policies. The new guidelines read: "Head lice are not a health hazard or a sign of poor hygiene and, in contrast to body lice, are not responsible for the spread of any disease. No healthy child should be excluded...

Kate Reese, a 13-year-old living in Reno, Nevada, used to think there was something wrong with her. “I began realizing I wasn’t necessarily straight when I was around 5 or 6,” Reese said. “I saw girls holding hands and thought, I could go for that. Girls were just more interesting.” Reese may have gone quite a few more years thinking that the innocent schoolyard crushes she harbored were indications of her deviance. But she was able to seek the language to describe herself, and assuage her worries, in a way older LGBT people never could — she had the internet.

A 12-year-old Michigan girl who just made it through the biggest fight of her life has been dealt another blow. In August 2012, Rose McGrath, of Battle Creek, was diagnosed with leukemia. But last week, her family received a letter from her school that would turn her world upside down. As CBS affiliate WWMT reports, the letter addressed concerns regarding Rose's attendance and academic performance, and stated that Rose had been dismissed from St. Joseph Middle School. "I didn't do anything wrong, but they still got rid of me," Rose said. screen-shot-2015-04-24-at-11-24-21-am.png Rose McGrath WWMT Rose has been with the...

BELVIDERE—A Warren County family is suing the state's Division of Child Protection and Permanency for alleged unconstitutional home intrusion and civil rights violations. Christopher Zimmer and his wife Nicole, of Belvidere, filed a civil rights complaint in United States District Court in Trenton yesterday against DCP&P, a DCP&P supervisor and one of its case workers for an alleged "unlawful and unconstitutional home intrusion of their home." "I won't forget that morning for a long, long time," said Mr. Zimmer, thinking back to a Tuesday morning in January that began with a caseworker pounding on their door. .... Mr. Zimmer said...

When Jacob Lemay invites you into his bedroom, he wants to give the full tour. He'll show you his books, the planets and stars on the wall, his bunk bed and the stuffed animals he's lined up all in a row. "This one is Chase, and that one is Zizzy," he says in the voice of a confident five-year-old. "And that one is Biscuit, and that one is Zarzo, and that one is Cheety, and that one is Snowflake, and that one is Fuzz." Jacob is a happy, healthy, well-adjusted pre-schooler. He has two sisters — one older and one...

A public school district in Oklahoma has agreed to stop allowing for the distribution of Bibles following threatened legal action from an atheist organization. Duncan Public Schools sent a letter to the American Humanist Association in response to a complaint leveled against an elementary school teacher who distributed several Gideon Bibles to her students. Scott W. Stone, legal counsel for Duncan Schools, explained to the AHA's legal arm the Appignani Humanist Legal Center that actions were being taken in response to their complaint. "All teachers and administrators in the district are being advised that they are not permitted to distribute...

American Family Association (AFA) is alerting parents about the upcoming "Day of Silence," sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), which urges teen students to practice homosexual activism in the public school classroom on Friday, April 17. On this day, AFA reported in an Action Alert yesterday to its 1 million friends and supporters, thousands of public high schools and an increasing number of middle schools will allow students to remain silent throughout an entire day—even during instructional time—to promote GLSEN's socio-political goals. "Parents must actively oppose this hijacking of the classroom for political purposes," said AFA...

Sydney Smoot might look like your average 4th grade girl, but she has taken such a bold stand against Common Core that she received a standing ovation from adults at least three times her age. The spunky student from Brooksville Elementary in Florida could barely reach the podium when she stood before the Hernando County School Board this month, but her presence could not have been clearer.Immediately addressing school officials, little Sydney never muddled her words as she described the dangerous impact that state standardized testing is having on students. “This testing looks at me as a number. One...

An Oregon school district has agreed to pay $225,000 to three girls who claimed in a lawsuit they were bullied into sending nude photos of themselves to boys at their middle school. The girls alleged in a 2013 “sextortion” lawsuit against the Clatskanie School District that the boys traded the embarrassing pictures like baseball cards and that school officials told them to “suck it up” when they complained. “I feel like it made me have to fight battles I shouldn’t have to fight, especially at such a young age, but I feel it made me stronger,” one of the girls,...

High school students in Wisconsin were asked to pretend that they were Muslims for a 10th grade World History writing assignment. Union Grove High School teacher Beth Urban asked students to write a five paragraph essay in which they pretend they are a Muslim male or female in the U.S. "Give three examples of what you do daily for your religion and any struggles you face," Urban instructed.

High school students in Wisconsin were asked to pretend that they were Muslims for a 10th grade World History writing assignment. Union Grove High School teacher Beth Urban asked students to write a five paragraph essay in which they pretend they are a Muslim male or female in the U.S. "Give three examples of what you do daily for your religion and any struggles you face," Urban instructed. The assignment has some questioning why this is part of a World History class and also if similar assignments were given for other religions. "I wonder if any of the kids who...

April 10, 2015 (BreakPoint.org) -- Already this year, we’ve seen a lot of evil: suicide bombings, the attacks in Paris, religious persecution, Boko Haram and ISIS. These have all outraged the world—and rightly so. But here’s a question worth pondering: will our kids be able to recognize evil when they see it? Do they even believe in moral facts?Well, that’s the question one educator asked recently in The New York Times after making a surprising discovery about what his child was learning in school.Justin McBrayer, an associate professor of ethics at Fort Lewis College, says he couldn’t figure out why...

Last week third grade children in New Jersey were recently told to write get well wishes to cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal. The teacher behind the letter writing campaign wrote “The mind of a child is where the revolution begins.”

President Barack Obama, through a statement posted Wednesday night on the White House website by adviser Valerie Jarrett, backed legislation that would ban parents from having their children counseled not to be what Jarrett called "LGBTQ+". “As part of our dedication to protecting America’s youth, this Administration supports efforts to ban the use of conversion therapy for minors,” Jarrett said in the White House statement. “Conversion therapy generally refers to any practices by mental health providers that seek to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity,” said the statement. “Often, this practice is used on minors, who lack the...

PEARLAND, Tex -- The allegations involve an eight-year-old girl in the second grade at Laura Bush Elementary School. A witness says he saw the whole thing. The little girl was sitting at what's called a 'guided reading' table. In court documents we uncovered, the witness says, he "observed (the teacher) take his iPhone ... hold it underneath the skirt of the victim." It also says that the teacher, "destroyed the iPhone after realizing he had been caught." But, it didn't end there. Court paperwork reveals the teacher "broke the phone by snapping it in half and throwing it into a...

In a major victory for prosecutors, a number of Atlanta educators were found guilty on Wednesday for their roles in public schools cheating scandal, bringing a close to a half-decade drama that tarnished a major school district’s reputation and raised questions nationwide about the wisdom of pushing educators to improve students’ standardized test scores. On their eighth day of deliberations, the jurors convicted 11 of the 12 defendants of racketeering, a felony that could put them in prison for decades. Many of the defendants — a mixture of teachers, testing coordinators and administrators — were also convicted of lesser charges,...

Kylee Moss, a 7-year-old-girl from Belton, Missouri, was sent home from school with a note to her mother saying that the 54-pound child’s Body Mass Index (BMI) was too high. Aside from the idiocy of using a discredited measurement for body fat, what are these administrators thinking? Obviously, they’re not. If they had two working brain cells, they would take one look at this kid and realize the stupidity of believing their “measurements.”

O’Fallon Superintendent Dr. Darcy G. Benway recently sent this letter out to parents. Dear Parents and Guardians:Pursuant to Illinois School Code (105 ILCS 75/15), OTHS is required to notify parents/guardians that we may request or require a student to provide a password or other related account information in order to gain access to the student’s account or profile on a social networking website if the district has reasonable cause to believe that the student’s account on a social networking website contains evidence that the student has violated a disciplinary rule or policy.This email serves as that notification.Thank you.Dr. Darcy G....

CHINO, CA, March 27, 2015 (LifeSiteNews.com) -- Southern California’s Chino High School is facing outrage from parents and students alike after school administrators decided to keep secret a teacher’s plan to undergo a sex change in the middle of the school year.The teacher in question, 32-year-old Michael Swager, showed up at work dressed and made up as a woman the morning of March 16, after eight years of teaching chemistry at the school as a man.  The teacher informed students that the 6’6”, 300 lb. man they once knew as “Michael” was now a woman, and told them they should...