School districts, layoffs and other things of interest....

[mom'sfolly]

Schools still say the Pledge with "one nation, under God". The "under God" was not in the original pledge, but was added in the fifties, as part of the fight against "godless communism". Saying the pledge cannot be compelled, due to a religious group's lawsuit; the argument was that they only pledge allegiance to god. The pledge was only written in the late 1800's and didn't become common for some time after that.

Children can pray, say Jesus, or Allah, have religious books in schools and pray. What the schools are not allowed to do is have teacher lead prayer, or prayer that an entire classroom is expected to participate in; or study religious books as part of the classroom work; except in historical context.

As for corporal punishment in schools... it simply doesn't belong. What one person sees as sending an appropriate message to a child, another might see as abuse. Who gets to decide what behavior warrants a whipping, what is the degree of force allowed, who administers the force, and how is the judgment made so that it is evenly applied? Is the annoyingly bouncy child who can't sit in their chair while pulling straight A's hit because they can't follow the simple rule of "sit down and shut up". Is the bully spanked? Tardiness, insolence, lack of restraint, name calling, how far over the line is enough? I think that corporal punishment would be a nightmare for schools. And god forbid you have a teacher that dislikes a child, is prejudiced or is just plain mean. Personally, any adult laying hands on my child would be charged with assault.

 

[Dunkopf]

Since when do people outside of school get punished for the right to free speech. I didn't say anything about the Constitution. That's not my gig. It was written over 200 years ago and has a lot of outdated stuff that can be interpreted in many different ways. The only real solid stuff is the laws regarding the structure of the government. The amendments are very open to interpretation.

I went to school from 64 to 76. In Colorado which is not a liberal bastion. No they didn't spank us. No we didn't have to get indoctrinated. The closest we came was a bible study class that was an elective in 10th grade. We also weren't taught atheism or pantheism. You told me the reason the churches get all the tax breaks they do is separation of church and state. Now you say it's not in the Constitution so presumably is not a factor. If churches are entitled to not pay taxes like the rest of us then they shouldn't have a right to vote or try to influence elections. There also shouldn't be public funds spent on religious edifices and replicas of religious artifacts to display on public grounds. I'm not talking about a manger scene at Christmas either. More along the lines of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse lawn.

I would have rather had a spanking than a grounding any day. Spankings wear off in a few minutes. If you read up on it you will find that most inmates were spanked as kids. So they came to prison in a pre spanked condition.

 

[AquaEyes]

Quote:
I was reading through this thread and also noticed how the "separation of church and state" argument was addressed from both sides by the same person, i.e. invoked to support the tax-free status of churches, but attacked as not being in the Constitution when it was used to defend keeping religion out of school.

Yes, the exact phrase "separation of church and state" does not exist in the Constitution. That phrase came from a letter written by Thomas Jefferson, in which he explained the purpose of the clause being to "provide a wall of separation between church and state." The Constitution is interpreted via words and intended meaning. I find it hard for someone to explain away the intended meaning of "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." when one of its authors and signers explicitly stated it shortly after. The reason the government doesn't tax churches is because that is seen as the government stepping over the wall and into the church's realm. In reciprocal fairness, churches are banned (per the 1954 Johnson Amendment) from allowing pastors to talk about political candidates from the pulpit using scriptures as justification for choosing one over the other. This would be churches stepping over the wall into government. Technically, when a church does this, it also steps into the land of taxation, but selective enforcement of this law is controversial.

Keeping religion and god out of school is not the same as putting atheism into school. Atheism states that there is no god. No religion means no mention of god. And the way it works under the literal words of the Constitution is that public schools receive government funding. A teacher using religion in a way that promotes it to be correct would be government funding of religion. The only way for true freedom OF religion is freedom FROM religion. Additionally, I would think that religious institutions each have their own preferred way of teaching their religion, and would not be very happy with how it was portrayed by someone trained to teach a secular subject. To put it more simply, keep your religion out of my science classroom, and I'll keep my science out of your church.

As per the Constitution, wasn't there supposed to be a convention every so often to review and amend the rules in accordance with changing times? My memory on that is hazy, but I don't think we've ever actually had one.

Corporal punishment does work, but not as well as alternatives. You can research for yourself through peer-reviewed studies if you don't believe me. Ranging from animal studies to cognitive studies in humans, providing a painful punishment for undesired behavior will promote quick decreases in that undesired behavior, but also increase anxiety and interfere with learning desired behavior. If it's not as effective as other means of education, why should our tax dollars support it being used in our schools?

Back to the OP....I empathize with teachers. Before I actually started classes, I seriously considered becoming a high school biology teacher, but changed my mind because I don't have what it takes to keep up with a captive audience. I bow to those of you who take on that challenge.

 

[chickened]

Where have you been living Dunkop? try saying racial, gay directed slurs and see what happens. And by open to interpretation do you mean "what the meaning of is is?"

The churches were added to the 501c3 status by LBJ in the 60s' and the premise behind their adding was that freedom of religion (first amendment) would be infringed on by the government if they (churches) were to pay taxes therefore giving authority to Government (paying taxes does give you representation) so LBJs' plan was to take churches out of politics but as usual the government messed that up and it backfired.

Separation of church and state was coined by the Supreme Court by a so-called interpretation. Now the Constitution does say that our rights are endowed by the creator and meant for all men I suppose that is up for interpretation also? The ten commandments were displayed on courthouses because our courts are modeled after the biblical version of justice like it or not that is where they came from originally. If folks want to go tear them out and it makes them feel good go for it.

As far as prisoners being spanked as kids then are you saying that if we don't spank will the prison population shrink? What came first the bad behavior from lack of discipline or did spanking cause it? if the latter then a whole lotta people should be incarcerated. Maybe the inmates weren't spanked enough? in essence are they still being spanked I mean violence is rampant in prison and physical restraint(note the word physical) is still practiced, point is they did not respect authority as a child and now they still have to be spanked in a different way only the system does it for the benefit of society. Ok now I am really done sorry.

 

[AquaEyes]

Quote:
No, actually, the phrase came from a letter written by Jefferson only a few years after the Constitution was written. The complete sentence, as quoted from the source below, is as follows:

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. "

http://www.usconstitution.net/jeffwall.html

The Supreme Court ruling merely upheld the original intent of the clause, as described by one of its authors, by evoking this document. Prior to that ruling, this original intent was ignored. This is why we have the balance of power, and a non-elected body whose far-reaching arm will wipe away laws written which contradict the words and intent of our nation's founding document.


I would shudder if our courts were actually modeled after the biblical version of "justice." Thankfully, they are not.

 

[chickened]

Study the Old Testament as it was meant for the Hebrew people not how they interpreted it and you will see a lot of similarities. Thank you for the clarification, things get hazy after 30 plus years of no schooling. Don't confuse mercy with justice my friend.
Quote:
No, actually, the phrase came from a letter written by Jefferson only a few years after the Constitution was written. The complete sentence, as quoted from the source below, is as follows:

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. "

http://www.usconstitution.net/jeffwall.html

The Supreme Court ruling merely upheld the original intent of the clause, as described by one of its authors, by evoking this document. Prior to that ruling, this original intent was ignored. This is why we have the balance of power, and a non-elected body whose far-reaching arm will wipe away laws written which contradict the words and intent of our nation's founding document.


I would shudder if our courts were actually modeled after the biblical version of "justice." Thankfully, they are not.

 

[mom'sfolly]

The Constitution does not mention the creator. The Declaration of Independence does have the phrase "they are endowed by their Creator" referring to rights. Our government is based on the Constitution, which only mentions religion in the Bill of Rights anti-establishment clause.

American law and government system is not based on the Ten Commandments, but on English common law and the Magna Carta.

 

[PineappleMama]

Quote:
Amen to that! Deut 13 scares the crap out of me... way too similar to the whole 'kill the infidel' line.

Anywho... http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/04/16/3005943/assistants-to-school-district.html

That link there is the latest bit on salaries and cuts in North Texas. NOT specifically Arlington, mentioned HEB (right next door to us on the Northern End), where I do NOT live so I donno whether that's a huge raise when you factor COL there or not but it seems shocking to me that a secretary is being paid over 50,000.00 a year for PART TIME work... plus drawing retirement from the TEACHERS' Retirement System of Texas. I thought Arlington was bad paying their clerks (who handle phones, paperwork, TAKS test stuff, report cards, all attendance, etc for the entire school) being paid 50k for FULL TIME work was stiff, but this is nuts. Now if that was just a fluke... just that one (extremely wealthy?) district that'd be one thing but read on...

In a 2010-11 Texas Association of School Boards survey, the median pay rate among 545 districts that responded to the survey was $40,079. It was $58,641 for districts with 50,000 or more students.

Several Tarrant County schools are at the top end of salaries reported for the biggest districts.

In Fort Worth, with about 80,000 students, the superintendent's executive assistant, Dolores Chapa, is paid $64,500. Her counterpart at the 15,000-student Northwest schools, Glenda Kelley, who is leaving the district in June, is paid $68,403. The top administrative assistant at the 62,000-student Arlington district, Cynthia Jones, is paid $61,987. A stronger comparison can be made with someone who runs the office of a corporate chief executive officer, said Mary Barrett, Texas Association of School Boards' assistant director of compensation services.

Those are some pretty high numbers... and for full time mind you... so the 50k for a PT one is just really insane... PLUS the teacher's pension to boot. The fact that these secretaries make more in a year than a teacher in that district, even with a masters, can hope to make is kinda nauseating for me. Makes it pretty clear that these schools care more for paperwork, that leads to cash in their pockets, than they do the childrens education.

How in the world did our PUBLIC school systems, your money and mine, end up paying like this? Fortune 500 company, I can understand. They make millions in profit in a month, or a week. But writing the checks from the PUBLIC checkbook... how in the world did we let it get to this point?

 

[AquaEyes]

"Justice" in the bible is as accorded by its god. "Justice" in our constitution is as accorded by its people. Therein lies the difference.

As to removing the Ten Commandments...I don't see why they were put there in the first place.

1) "I am the Lord your God" (no relevance)
2) "You shall have no other gods before me" and "You shall not make for yourself an idol" (in contradiction to First Amendment)
3) "Do not take the name of the Lord in vain" (in contradiction to the First Amendment)
4) "Remember the sabbath and keep it holy" (no relevance, and contradiction to First Amendment)
5) "Honor your father and mother" (no relevance)
6) "You shall not kill/murder" (relevance, but the Ten Commandments isn't by far the only source of this idea)
7) "You shall not commit adultery" (relevance with regards to violating marital law, but little else)
8) "You shall not steal" (relevance, but the Ten Commandments isn't by far the only source of this idea)
9) "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor" (relevance, but enforceable only when under oath in a courtroom)
10) "You shall not covet your neighbor's wife" (barely relevant) and "You shall not covet anything that belongs to your neighbor" (um, isn't one of the driving forces of capitalism "keeping up with the Joneses"?)

So how does the above relate to how this country works?

Quote:
No, actually, the phrase came from a letter written by Jefferson only a few years after the Constitution was written. The complete sentence, as quoted from the source below, is as follows:

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. "

http://www.usconstitution.net/jeffwall.html

The Supreme Court ruling merely upheld the original intent of the clause, as described by one of its authors, by evoking this document. Prior to that ruling, this original intent was ignored. This is why we have the balance of power, and a non-elected body whose far-reaching arm will wipe away laws written which contradict the words and intent of our nation's founding document.


I would shudder if our courts were actually modeled after the biblical version of "justice." Thankfully, they are not.

 

[Dunkopf]

Quote: