..."Many Mount Vernon Middle School students have been vocal in their support of science teacher John Freshwater in his claims to a First Amendment right to display a Bible on his desk. But are those students willing to grant someone else equal rights to remain neutral or to disagree? Several comments from students and parents indicate that acceptance and religious tolerance is a one-way street for many concerned."

It seems that Christian children aren't very "big tent" in their support of a Christian science teacher, a man who has allegedly done some seriously controversial things in the classroom.

"My daughter Arie told me about a Jewish child who brought his Torah to school when other students brought Bibles in support of Freshwater ... He thought he was supporting freedom of religious expression, and the other kids just ripped him apart. 'What are you doing?' they asked. 'You can't support Mr. Freshwater, you're Jewish' ... I don't think people realize the depth of what's going on between the students. It's a mob mentality right now. It's peer pressure. To not wear a T-shirt and to not bring your Bible when they say bring your Bible and wear a T-shirt, you're asking for trouble ... one of Arie's friends wore a T-shirt to school that read, 'I don't need to wear a special T-shirt to be a Christian.' That individual was reportedly pushed into the lockers and called a 'stupid atheist b****.'"

In the whirlwind of Friday's final day of the legislative session, one high-profile proposal went, well, extinct.

The House and Senate could not agree on a bill to make sure public-school science teachers could raise questions about evolution.

Social and religious conservatives started pushing for such a bill after the state Board of Education approved science standards this year that included teaching evolution.

The Senate passed the "Evolution Academic Freedom Act'' that would have given teachers the "right and freedom to objectively present scientific information relevant to the full range of scientific views'' about evolution.

Land 'O Lakes, Florida -- The stories in the news about inappropriate relationships between teachers and students have been overwhelming.  There was even a substitute teacher in New Port Richey who got in trouble after investigators say she had a relationship with an underage student.

Well, another Pasco County substitute teacher's job is on the line, but this time it's because of a magic trick.

The charge from the school district — Wizardry!

Substitute teacher Jim Piculas does a 30-second magic trick where a toothpick disappears then reappears.

But after performing it in front of a classroom at Rushe Middle School in Land 'O Lakes, Piculas said his job did a disappearing act of its own.

"I get a call the middle of the day from the supervisor of substitute teachers.  He says, 'Jim, we have a huge issue.  You can't take any more assignments.  You need to come in right away,'" he said.

When Piculas went in, he learned his little magic trick cast a spell that went much farther than he'd hoped.

"I said, 'Well Pat, can you explain this to me?'  'You've been accused of wizardry,' [he said]. Wizardry?" he asked.

SEATTLE, April 30 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Five states are currently considering adoption of academic freedom legislation designed to protect teachers who teach both the scientific strengths and weaknesses of evolutionary theory. Introduction of similar legislation is being considered by legislators in several other states, indicating the national scope of this movement.

"Often in this debate the issues at hand get misrepresented, and so our goal is to fully and straightforwardly explain that this is about science and helping prepare the best scientists of the future for our state and for our country," said Rep. John Moolenar, sponsor of academic freedom legislation in Michigan. "And a big part of that is enabling them to have the academic freedom to explore and critically examine scientific theories."

A Boston city councilor is raising concerns about a pilot school’s proposed curriculum and its ties to an arm of Scientology, while a prestigious Hub charitable foundation is taking a second look at its grant to help launch the controversial school.

“We’re reviewing the grant proposal in light of new materials,” Boston Foundation spokesman David Trueblood said of the organization’s $20,000 gift to the proposed “Cornerstone for Success Academy.”

The Herald reported yesterday that the proposed taxpayer-funded high school would base its curriculum on a model created by Applied Scholastics International - the educational arm of the Church of Scientology. Applied Scholastics officials, however, say the program is not religious and is run separately from the church.


The grant will be used as seed money by a group of Hub teachers pushing for the new pilot school, which needs approval of Boston school and union officials. Trueblood said the Boston Foundation did “no evaluation” and didn’t know of the Scientology link - despite references to Applied Scholastics in the group’s application.

Tennessee's public school students are legally safe to learn about the Bible's impact on literature, art and politics so long as the lessons aren't sermons, a new opinion from the state's Attorney General says.

The judgment, released Tuesday, also declares that a pending legislative bill that would authorize the state to create a nonsectarian Bible elective curriculum passes constitutional muster.

A handful of Tennessee school districts already know that. At least four, including Wilson County, offer such a class approved by the state Department of Education as a special course that counts as a social studies or literature elective.

Still, bill sponsor Sen. Roy Herron, D-Dresden, said he requested a legal opinion to send a clear message that an academic, nonreligious Bible class has a place in public classrooms.

"It was not out of my doubt in its constitutionality; it was out of a commitment to making it certain that none can deny its constitutionality," Herron said.

Recently, I wrote about Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (TIZA), a K-8 charter school in Inver Grove Heights. Charter schools are public schools and by law must not endorse or promote religion.

Evidence suggests, however, that TIZA is an Islamic school, funded by Minnesota taxpayers.

TIZA has many characteristics that suggest a religious school. It shares the headquarters building of the Muslim American Society of Minnesota, whose mission is "establishing Islam in Minnesota." The building also houses a mosque. TIZA's executive director, Asad Zaman, is a Muslim imam, or religious leader, and its sponsor is an organization called Islamic Relief.

Students pray daily, the cafeteria serves halal food - permissible under Islamic law -- and "Islamic Studies" is offered at the end of the school day.

Zaman maintains that TIZA is not a religious school. He declined, however, to allow me to visit the school to see for myself, "due to the hectic schedule for statewide testing." But after I e-mailed him that the Minnesota Department of Education had told me that testing would not begin for several weeks, Zaman did not respond -- even to urgent calls and e-mails seeking comment before my first column on TIZA.

The Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday gave a partisan passing grade to the bill critics say is designed to challenge the teaching of evolution in Florida classrooms.

Sen. Ronda Storms, a Tampa-area Republican and former teacher, is carrying the bill at the behest of religious groups who lost a close vote to amend Florida's science-teaching standards earlier this year. the Academic Freedom bill, as it's known, says teachers can't be discriminated against for teaching ideas contrary to the theory of evolution.

As a practicing Catholic whose eighth-grade son, Michael, has always attended parochial schools, Susan Bisig says it would be best for him to attend St. Xavier High School.

The 144-year-old Catholic secondary school also happens to be Michael's first choice.

But Bisig's ex-husband, David Ryan, an atheist who has joint custody of their 14-year-old son, wants Michael to attend a nonreligious high school.

And he says the Kentucky Constitution is on his side because it says no one shall be "compelled to send his child to any school to which he may be conscientiously opposed."

The battle between Ryan and Bisig, both commercial pilots, has landed in Oldham County Family Court, where Judge Tim Feeley has said he will decide within the next couple of weeks where 14-year-old Michael Ryan will attend high school next year.

Whichever parent wins will pay Michael's tuition, Feeley said.

the bigger picture