Furor over Arabic assignment leads Virginia school district to close Friday

Washington Post ^ | 18 Dec 2015 | Moriah Balingit and Emma Brown

[mandaladon]

A teacher at Riverheads High in Staunton, Va., had students practice calligraphy by copying the Muslim statement of faith. The assignment caused so much controversy that school officials decided to shut down all public schools in Augusta County on Friday. (Reuters)

A Virginia county closed all of its schools Friday because of intense backlash over a class assignment about Islam, with some parents alleging that their children were being subjected to Muslim indoctrination and educators emphasizing the importance of exposing U.S. students to the world’s fastest-growing religion.

A high school geography teacher in rural Augusta County asked students to try their hand at writing the shahada, an Islamic declaration of faith, in Arabic calligraphy. The task, community reaction to it, and a sudden influx of outrage from around the country — including angry emails, phone calls and threats to put the teacher’s head on a stake — led the school district to close rather than risk disruption or violence.

The county, in the Shenandoah valley west of Charlottesville, Va., is the latest to wrestle with how Islam should be portrayed in the classroom and how students should learn about it. It’s a subject that has become increasingly fraught as concerns about Islamophobia have grown alongside fears of extremist violence and terrorism.

[P-Marlowe]

I doubt if they used this for a calligraphy lesson:

[timestax]

bttt

[silverleaf]

This

And have the male students try on yarmulkes
Esp the muslims

[boop]

What's odd is it's "only Christian" parents that are enraged.

Remember when Burger King had an ice cream sundae cup that had a swirl on it?

Muslims went apecrap because the swirls resembled the loops that mean "allah".

They found it sacriligious.

If the kids made loops and swirls that were not JUST SO, wouldn't that enrage Muslims, too?

[The_Media_never_lie]

9-11 taught us all we need to know about it.

[The_Media_never_lie]

The assignment was designed to get the children interested in islam. Not an innocent assignment.

[Chode]

good...

[The_Reader_David]

So did they closed Friday so all the new Muslims could go to Friday prayers at the local mosque, or was it to cancel the lesson that involved in-school Friday prayers?

[Peet]

The black Muslim movement is ironic in that it is blind to the role that Muslims played and still play in the slave trade. Nation of Islam people tell black Americans to reject their “slave names” and embrace Muslim names when it is very likely that back Americans’ earliest ancestors were herded to the slave ships by men sporting Muslim names.

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I find it hysterically amusing that blacks in America just *LOVE* 0bama yet are ignorant that *his* ancestors were likely selling *their* ancestors into slavery.

Same meme as yours but I used different words.

FRegards and Merry Christmas

[Nailbiter]

is the latest to wrestle with how Islam should be portrayed in the classroom

Might I suggest “jefferson translation of quran”
found quite a few examples online