Free Republic

The academic left has painted itself into a peculiar corner. They urge the rejection of traditional grammar as chauvinistic, or, more frequently, “hegemonic.” Unfortunately for them, they eventually have to read papers by students who have previously been taught by teachers who also share this outlook. One of the seminal texts that promotes the “grammar is dead” thesis is Preparing to Teach Writing by James Williams. “Ironically, the third edition of Williams’ book Preparing to Teach Writing appeared in 2003, the same year the National Commission on Writing made public its discovery that ‘Recent analyses indicate that more than 50...

Frank Strickland knew something was wrong when Lisa Jane Phillips told stories of heroism in Iraq and Afghanistan on her college campus in Raleigh, N.C. The Meredith College student said she was a pilot, and wore an Air Force captain's uniform with numerous medals to prove it. Phillips frequently left school for a few weeks at a time, saying she was going on a mission. But Strickland, the campus police chief and a helicopter pilot during the Vietnam War, was skeptical of her claims of two-week deployments to combat areas like Iraq and Afghanistan. He notified federal investigators of his...

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - A Cary woman who attended Meredith College is charged with impersonating a military officer, fraud and other crimes. Investigators say Lisa Jane Phillips began attending the school in January 2002, wearing the uniform of an Air Force captain. She left a short time later, saying she had been deployed as a pilot to Afghanistan. Phillips returned to the college couple of months later with medals on the uniform she wore to class and stories of missions to Iraq and elsewhere. School officials waived her tuition of more than 42-thousand dollars because of her military service. But...