“Texas A&M Students Form Human Wall To Block Westboro Baptist Church Protestors From Soldier Roy Tisdale’s Funeral”

This story definitely made our day in light of the tragic shootings in Aurora, Colorado. The students at Texas A&M prove that students can really make a difference. May they continue to be incredible upstanders.

Taken from: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/06/texas-am-students_n_1653002.html

July 17, 2012

Hundreds of Texas A&M students gathered this week to form a human wall around the funeral service of a soldier to protect his family from Westboro Baptist Church protesters, KBTX.com reports.

Texas A&M alum Lt. Col. Roy Tisdale died on June 28 during a safety briefing at Fort Bragg, N.C. Tisdale was killed by another soldier who then fatally shot himself. Tisdale had served in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

In the days after the soldier’s death, word spread that Westboro Baptist Church members were planning to protest Tisdale’s funeral. Described as a “homophobic and anti-Semitic hate group” by the Anti-Defamation League, Westboro Baptist Church regularly stages protests around the country. According to KBTX.com, the group, which is based in Kansas, frequently targets military funerals because of “a belief that God punishes soldiers because of America’s tolerance of gays.”

When Ryan Slezia, a former Texas A&M student, heard of the group’s plans, he hatched a plot to foil their efforts. ”In response to their signs of hate, we will wear maroon. In response to their mob anger, we will form a line, arm in arm. This is a silent vigil. A manifestation of our solidarity,” he wrote on Facebook, inviting others to join him in a peaceful protest.

On Thursday, as Tisdale’s funeral was held at the Central Baptist Church in College Station, Tex., hundreds of students and alumni responded to Slezia’s invation, linking arms to create a human barricade surrounding the church’s entrance.

Most wore maroon — A&M’s school color. One participant tweeted that over 650 people showed up, creating a formidable “maroon wall.” “We are standing here quietly. We are here for the family,” Lilly McAlister, a Texas A&M student, told KBTX.com. ”We are positioned with our backs to them. Everyone has been told there’s no chanting, no singing, there’s no yelling anything back.”

The hundreds gathered were prepared for a potentially aggressive confrontation, but the protestors from Westboro Baptist Church never showed up.

One participant tweeted:

Erica Peaslee@erica_peaslee

#MaroonWall at Central Baptist. No sign of Westboro …. hope they aren’t too intimidated. pic.twitter.com/LCDrTrH1

Tisdale’s body was peacefully laid to rest after the funeral at the Aggie Field of Honor — a cemetery for Texas A&M students and staff.

“Hoodies and Hijabs: Uncovering Injustice”

Wake Forest and Salem Students, organized by Muslim peers, came together to show solidarity with Trayvonn Martin and Shaima Al Awadhi. Students are calling on our community leaders to condemn hate crimes and make sure our community is a safe place for everyone.

Please re-post this picture to raise awareness about these atrocities! Let’s encourage other Universities & schools to create photographs such as this one!

“Chardon High School Shooting: One Dead, Four Injured”

Taken from: http://gma.yahoo.com/chardon-high-school-shooting-one-dead-four-injured-140607604–abc-news.html

February 27, 2012

One student has died following a shooting this morning at Chardon High School in Ohio. Four others were injured and the shooter is in custody.

“There is one deceased student,” Chardon Police Chief Tim McKenna said at a news conference. “That’s the sad news for all of us today.”

Police will not yet identify the gunman, saying only that he has not yet been charged and that he is a juvenile.

The gunman opened fire with a handgun just before 8 a.m. in the school cafeteria where students were eating breakfast, authorities and witnesses said.

The shooter was chased out of the building by a teacher and later turned himself in to a passerby, authorities said. Police have not yet confirmed whether the gunman was a student at the school, but junior Heather Ziska told the Associated Press she just a few feet away when he opened fire and she recognized the shooter as a fellow student.

The suspect is in custody at Geauga County Safety Center, according to ABC News’ Cleveland affiliate WEWS.

“Our prayers go out to the five victims and their families,” a choked up School Superintendent Jospeh Bergant said at news conference. “It’s a horrible tragedy.”

Geauga County Sheriff Daniel McClelland praised the reaction to the shooting. ”A prompt entry was made into the school. They went into the school and located the victims. It became readily apparent that the shooter had fled already,” McClelland said. “The individual was apprehended some distance from the school and had fled on foot.”

The officer said police created a security perimeter to make sure the gunman could not return and a search, including a K-9 unit, was launched for the suspect.

Two students were taken by ambulance to Hillcrest Hospital and three were taken by helicopter to MetroHealth Hospital, according to WEWS.

Parent Teresa Hunt told WEWS that she was texting with her daughter during the lockdown and her daughter said she heard five shots fired in the cafeteria about 7:30 a.m. Her daughter texted that students were scared and that four people had been shot.

Chardon student Evan Erasmus told WEWS that a student had tweeted that he was going to bring a gun to school, but that no one took him seriously.

The Chardon Fire Department was called to the school at about 7:45 a.m. in response to a report of “several people shot,” according to Inspector William Crowley of the Chardon Fire Department.

Multiple law enforcement agencies, including a SWAT team, rushed to the school.

The superintendent immediately canceled classes at all schools in the district. Students who were still on school buses were being dropped back off at their homes and parents were called to pick up their children that were already at school. The Chardon School District sent a voicemail to parents that schools are closed and high school students are being moved to the middle school, according to WEWS.

Parents received the following message: ”As of 9:00 AM the alleged sole CHS gunman is in custody and Chardon High School students are being moved by safety forces to Maple Elementary. Parents or legal guardians can pick up their students up any time. Chardon Middle School students are also being released to parents.”

Ohio Gov. John Kasich tweeted around 9:30 a.m., “Pls pray for wounded Chardon HS students, their families, and their community; appears things under control now.”

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has eight agents on their way to the scene and they are expected to trace the firearm.

Chardon is a village in Geauga County, about 35 miles east of Cleveland, Ohio.

“Teacher Charged with Taking Bondage Pics of Students”

Taken from: http://news.yahoo.com/teacher-charged-taking-bondage-pics-students-163621853–abc-news.html

January 31, 2012

A former elementary school teacher in Los Angeles has been arrested for allegedly molesting nearly two dozen children after photos of students posed in bondage positions were passed to the Sheriff’s Department.

Mark Berndt, 61, a teacher with over 30 years experience at Miramonte Elementary School in south Los Angeles, is charged with molesting 23 children, according to a statement from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

Police began the investigation after a photo processing facility passed along suspicious images depicting students blindfolded with their mouths covered in tape. Female students were depicted with a blue plastic spoon containing “an unknown clear/white liquid” in front of their mouths, while other students were pictured with live cockroaches on their faces. In some photos, Berndt had his arm around the children or his hand over their mouths. Police found the spoon, along with an empty container in the trash in Berndt’s classroom and, through DNA testing, determined that both contained Berndt’s semen.

The students were between the ages of 7 and 10 years old when the alleged crimes occurred, police said.

Authorities launched a widespread sex crime investigation, interviewing current and former students and school employees and searching Berndt’s home. They recovered a total of 390 photographs and an adult “sexual bondage” film which mirrored the photos of the children, according to a statement by the sheriff’s department today. More than 26 children from the 390 photographs have been identified; an additional 10 children have not yet been identified, police said.

Shortly after the investigation began, in March, 2011, Berndt was fired from the school. The school did not immediately return calls for comment today. Berndt was arrested Monday and charged with 23 felony counts of lewd acts upon a child. He is being held at LA County jail in lieu of $2.3 million bail.

“African-American Boys Receive Less Attention, Lower Grades And Harsher Punishment In School”

Taken from:  http://newsone.com/nation/washington-watch/rolandsmartin/study-african-american-boys-receive-less-attention-harsher-punishment-and-lower-grades-in-school/

A recent study by the Yale University Child Study Center shows that Black children — especially boys — no matter their family income, receive less attention, harsher punishment and lower marks in school than their White counterparts from kindergarten all the way through college. A subsequent article published in “The Washington Post” reported that Black children in the Washington, D.C. area are suspended or expelled two to five times more often than White children. It’s a national trend that needs to be addressed.

Judith Browne Dianis, co-director of the Advancement Project joined Roland Martin on Washington Watch to discuss this disturbing trend.

“Students take on “I Have a Dream”

“Native American Youth to Diane Sawyer: We’re Not Poverty Porn”

Taken from: http://colorlines.com/archives/2011/12/native_american_youth_to_abcs_diane_sawyer_were_more_than_poverty.html

December 14, 2011

Last month ABC’s 20/20 aired a special they called “Children of the Plains,” that portrayed the Lakota Indian reservation as a place that only dealt with crime, unemployment, alcoholism, overcrowded trailers and crumbling schools.

On Monday, young Native American students from Rosebud, South Dakota released a short video that challenged the claims made by “Children of the plains.” “I know what you probably think of us…we saw the special too. Maybe you saw a picture, or read an article. But we want you to know, we’re more than that…We have so much more than poverty.”

“The stories are manipulative to the point of tears—literally,” wrote Rob Schmidt on Indian Country about the show. “A boy cries because his mother is an alcoholic. A girl cries because she tried to commit suicide. The school principal, an old lady in a motorized chair, cries because her work is so difficult.” Schmidt argues the ABC documentary was little more than poverty porn because it didn’t offer any historical context or the causes of poverty for many Native American reservations. “Are the Lakota responsible for their own plight, or is someone—the government or big business—causing it?,” Schmidt continued.

Sawyer glossed over broken treaties, stolen land and disinvestment by the end of the show, but by then it’s too little, too late. “The ‘poverty porn’ feeling predominates,” Schmidt said.

“Pakistan seminary raid finds students held in abusive conditions”

Taken from: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2011/12/pakistan-madrasas-abuse.html

December 13, 2011

REPORTING FROM ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN, AND NEW DELHI — Police rescued approximately 50 students late Monday from an Islamic seminary in Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city, several of whom were reportedly chained in a basement, denied food and pressured to join the Taliban.

It wasn’t immediately clear why the students, who ranged in age from around 12 to 50, were subjected to such treatment. But police, who conducted the raid after getting tipped off by neighbors, told local media that some of the young men were drug addicts sent there by parents unaware of the horrible conditions.

Video footage showed boys and men restrained by heavy chains on their ankles. Other shots showed several celebrating after being set free.

At least two staff members at the Madrasa Zakarya seminary were arrested, although the leader of the facility in Karachi’s Sohrab Goth neighborhood reportedly escaped. Pakistan’s Interior Ministry has ordered an investigation.Government statistics suggest there are over 15,000 madrasas, or Islamic seminaries, in Pakistan educating some 2 million students. Most parents who send their children to madrasas, some of which have a reputation for fomenting extremism, do so because they generally cost less than other schools, provide meals and have teachers who show up.

Nazish Brohi, a sociologist and women’s rights activist in Karachi, said corporal punishment and abuse occur in mainstream schools as well as madrasas, even though it’s illegal. “The problem is that all efforts at regulating madrasas have failed,” she said, adding that the government isn’t very strong on oversight over all sorts of institutions.

While there’s been some slight improvement in madrasa oversight — largely focused on trying to prevent them from sending their students to Afghanistan or Pakistani tribal areas to become fighters — it hasn’t extended to the curriculum or the quality of education students receive at the institutions, experts said.

“This isn’t the first time they’ve found students chained, although it may be the first time it’s been running live on TV,” Brohi said. “My concern, with the shock and horror of this case, is that people will focus on this one incident rather than the wider issue of oversight.”

“How the Future Looks From High School”

Taken from: http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/22/how-the-future-looks-from-high-school/?ref=education

November 24, 2011

This is a stressful stretch for high school seniors, who, to judge by the stories at the top of most-e-mailed lists, are taking the SATs, racing to file early-decision and financial-aid applications and sweating to earn the last AP grades that matter. But others feel different pressures, having tough conversations with their parents about working after graduation to afford community college, or joining the military.

How does the future look to a high school senior?

We checked in with 15 of them, at four American high schools. These public schools are not intended to be statistically representative, but they are also not random: they are the high schools from which the editors of Room for Debate graduated. We hope readers, from high school seniors to senior citizens, will respond in comments: What are the pressures on students at your high school? What are 18-year-olds in your hometown expecting from their careers?

Read more here.

“Teacher Caught on Tape Bullying Student. Is a Camera a Kid’s Only Advocate?”

Taken from: http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/teacher-caught-tape-bullying-student-camera-kids-only-224600400.html

November 16, 2011

Nobody believed Julio Artuz, a 15 year old New Jersey special education student, when he complained of being bullied by his teacher. So he caught the whole thing on tape. In footage captured in secret on his cellphone, Artuz is subjected to curses and berating from a man who’s supposed to be a mentor.

Artuz’s teacher says: “I will kick your [expletive] from here to kingdom come until I’m 80 years old.”

“Don’t threaten me,” responds Artuz.

“What are you going to do? You gonna get a chopper and chop me?” asks his teacher as the rest of the class sits rubbernecking the heated argument.

What Jules did do was show his taped account to his parents and a local advocate of bullied students. After an NBC news affiliate in Philadelphia got hold of the footage, the school immediately took action, placing the teacher on paid administrative leave pending an investigation.  ”The actions depicted on the video do not reflect the mission or culture of our school,” said Gloucester Counter Special Services Superintendent Michael Dicken in a statement. “Our school district takes all bullying, harassment, and intimidation allegations seriously…we do not tolerate it.”

While schools may not tolerate that kind of abuse of power, it takes a lot to make it stop. In a separate incident earlier this week, an Ohio special needs student came forward with an account of long-term bullying from her two teachers. She actually had to attend school wired with a recording device to capture proof of her teachers calling her “dumb”, “lazy” and overweight. Another shocking incident this month involved a high school basketball coach who was captured on cell phone video making deeply offensive, racist remarks about students while in school.

“Statistically about 1 to 2 percent of teachers are actually involved in bullying students,” says Dr. Joel Haber, a clinical psychologist who runs the anti-bullying website RespectU. “There needs to be a clear policy in schools not just for students bullying other students but for teachers as well. Teachers are humans too and this kind of thing does happen, so it needs to be managed early.”

While more schools have introduced anti-bullying codes of conduct for students, teachers aren’t always considered a threat.
It’s a murky issue for many school administrators. Where’s the bullying line when you’re managing an unruly classroom? “Its blurry sure but you know when someone wants to make a kid feel bad, or when they’re abusing their power as an authority figure,” says Dr. Haber. “That’s not the way a role model should be managing a student. “

A bullying teacher doesn’t just threaten to knock a student’s self-confidence, he can destroy a kid’s confidence in his school. “Teachers are supposed to make students feel safe,” Dr. Haber says. When school becomes a fearful environment because of a teacher, students suddenly think ‘well who can I trust then?’”

In Artuz’ case, his phone was best bet. It’s possible nobody would have listened if they didn’t see it firsthand. “When you watch a video like that live, it really creates a different image than if you were to just hear about,” says Dr. Haber.  It’s a powerful defense, especially for students who don’t feel their complaints would be recognized otherwise. It also sends a message to teachers: watch how you speak to your students, someone might be taping you.

Watch video here:

http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/133858078.html

“Court blocks Alabama from checking student status”

Taken from: http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9QC8DBG0.htm

October 14, 2011

A federal appeals court on Friday blocked a key part of Alabama’s law that requires schools to check the immigration status of students, temporarily weakening what was considered the toughest immigration law in the nation.

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also blocked a part of the law that allows authorities to charge immigrants who do not carry documents proving their legal status. The three-judge panel let stand a provision that allows police to detain immigrants that are suspected of being in the country illegally.

The decision doled out partial victories to both sides of the law. It also let stand other provisions that barred state courts from enforcing contracts involving illegal immigrants and make it a felony for an illegal immigrant to do business with the state for basic things like obtaining drivers licenses.

Alabama House Speaker Mike Hubbard, who championed the law, said the “most effectual parts” of the law will remain in place. ”We’ve said from the beginning that Alabama will have a strict immigration law and we will enforce it. Alabama will not be a sanctuary state for illegal aliens, and this ruling reinforces that.”

The advocacy groups who challenged the law said they were hopeful the panel would block the remainder of the law within months after they review more arguments from both sides. ”I think that certainly it’s a better situation today for the people of Alabama today than it was yesterday,” said Omar Jadwat, an attorney for the ACLU, which challenged the law along with the Obama administration. “Obviously we remain concerned about the remainder of the provisions, and we remain confident that we will eventually get the whole scheme blocked.”

Alabama Republicans have long sought to clamp down on illegal immigration and passed the law earlier this year after gaining control of the Legislature for the first time since Reconstruction. Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley signed the measure, saying it was crucial to protect the jobs of legal residents amid the tough economy and high unemployment.

The law has already had a deep impact in Alabama since a federal judge upheld much of it in late September. Many frightened Hispanics have been driven away from Alabama, fearing they could be arrested or targeted by police. Construction workers, landscapers and field hands have stopped showing up for work, and large numbers of Hispanic students have been absent from public schools. To cope with the labor shortage, Alabama agriculture commissioner John McMillan at one point suggested farmers should consider hiring inmates in the state’s work-release program. It’s not clear exactly how many Hispanics have fled the state. Earlier this week, many skipped work to protest the law, shuttering or scaling back operations at chicken plants, Mexican restaurants and other businesses.

Immigration has become a hot-button issue in Alabama over the past decade as the Hispanic population has grown by 145 percent to about 185,600 people, most of them of Mexican origin. The Hispanic population represents about 4 percent of the state’s 4.7 million people, but some counties in north Alabama have large Spanish-speaking communities and schools where most of the students are Hispanic.

Requiring school officials to check the immigration status of students in public schools helped make the Alabama law stricter than similar measures enacted in Arizona, Utah, Indiana and Georgia. Federal judges in those states have blocked all or parts of those laws.

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer earlier this year asked the U.S. Supreme Court to resolve the legal fight over her state’s tough immigration law. The Justice Department called the Alabama law a “sweeping new state regime” in court filings last week and urged the appeals court to forbid states from creating a patchwork of immigration policies. The agency also said the law could strain diplomatic relations with Latin American countries, who have warned the law could impact millions of workers, tourists and students in the U.S. ”Other states and their citizens are poorly served by the Alabama policy, which seeks to drive aliens from Alabama rather than achieve cooperation with the federal government to resolve a national problem,” the attorneys have said in court documents.

Thomas Perez, head of the Justice Department’s civil rights division, said Friday before the ruling that a team of attorneys is in Alabama trying to determine whether the law was leading to civil rights violations. The school requirement was an area of particular worry, and the federal government is trying to determine how many absentees and withdrawals might be linked to the law, Perez said. ”We’re hearing a number of reports about increases in bullying that we’re studying,” he said after a meeting with leaders and advocates for the Hispanic community.

Legal experts are closely watching the Alabama case, which they say has the potential to be considered by the U.S. Supreme Court. I’m not convinced that the Supreme Court is going to take it up. But it depends on how 11th Circuit will rule in this case,” said Charles Kuck, a Georgia attorney who is the former president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “They are holding the key hand here. But you just never know.”

“Regents Plan Push for Aid to Illegal Immigrants”

Taken from: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/15/nyregion/new-york-regents-plan-a-push-for-the-dream-act.html?_r=1&hpw

October 14, 2011

When they vote on their legislative agenda on Tuesday, New York State’s top education officials will focus for the first time on the contentious topic of illegal immigration.

The agenda, proposed by the state education commissioner, John B. King Jr., to the Board of Regents, has as a top priority a proposal to push Congress to pass legislation that would provide a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants who go to college. Included in that legislation, known as the Dream Act, is a provision that would give students who are in the country illegally access to tuition assistance at city and state universities. The agenda is expected to be approved.

The lobbying effort would thrust the State Education Department into the heart of a highly politicized debate that has divided communities for years and spawned a hodgepodge of state regulations in response to the federal government’s inaction on reforming the country’s immigration laws. New York already allows illegal immigrants to pay in-state tuition rates at state universities. Gov. Rick Perry of Texas signed a similar measure into law in 2001; controversy surrounding it has threatened to derail his effort to gain the Republican presidential nomination.

In an interview, Dr. King said that the Regents’ strategy on the Dream Act would address one of the most significant roadblocks faced by an estimated 345,000 illegal immigrants who attend public schools in New York. By providing help with tuition and with residency documents, the federal law would allow those who graduate from college to strive for more than the menial jobs they must often accept because of their status. “It’s about making sure that students are able to fulfill their aspirations after they graduate from high school, which is something that’s currently not available to those who happen to be undocumented,” Dr. King said. In addition, he said, “it aligns perfectly with our college-and-career readiness goals.” Dr. King said that lobbying Congress would be the “first step” in a campaign that could progress to asking the State Legislature to do what California did just a few days ago: offer state-financed scholarships and aid to illegal immigrants attending state universities.

For now, the plan is to write to and visit the members of Congress from New York, as well as legislators from other states who could play decisive roles in the Dream Act’s passage. The bill, first introduced in 2000, has yet to gain enough support for passage. It would create a path to citizenship for certain young illegal immigrants who came to the United States as children, completed two years of college or military service and met other requirements, like passing a criminal background check.

For the past several months, Dr. King and the Board of Regents’ chancellor, Merryl H. Tisch, have taken an interest in addressing the needs of the state’s immigrant students, most of whom go to school in New York City. “These people are going to be citizens of this country some day, and we need to prepare them for a life of independence,” Dr. Tisch said.

On Wednesday, Dr. King announced an agreement to improve the services offered in city schools to students who are still learning English, like more access to certified teachers and to the language lessons to which they are legally entitled.

Chung-Wha Hong, executive director of the New York Immigration Coalition, an advocacy group, said the Regents’ agenda was a natural evolution of a process begun years ago to refine the state’s policies regarding students who are not proficient in English. “It really brings the focus back to what the issue is about,” she said. “It’s about education, and it’s about our children.”

Some critics of immigration reform criticized the Regents’ plan as going too far. “This amounts to a much broader amnesty than the New York State Board of Regents wants to portray it,” said Ira Mehlman, a spokesman for the Federation of American Immigration Reform, which has called for reducing the levels of illegal immigration.

But Daniela Alulema, a board member of the New York State Youth Leadership Council, a supporter of access to higher education for illegal immigrants, said she hoped the Regents would eventually throw their support behind a version of the Dream Act introduced in the State Legislature in March. Among other things, the bill would give illegal immigrants access to tuition assistance and driver’s licenses, a provision that crumbled under intense criticism in 2007, after it was proposed by Gov. Eliot Spitzer. Ms. Alulema has pinned her hopes on state action. “The truth is, it’s very hard for something to happen in Congress because of the climate there now,” she said.

“None of the Above”

Taken from: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/15/your-money/for-children-of-same-sex-couples-a-student-aid-maze.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=all

October 14, 2011

It took five attempts for one prospective college student and her mother to fill out the 106-question federal form that would determine whether she would be eligible for financial aid. And that was not just because the form was frustratingly complicated. What tripped them up was the fact that the student had two legal mothers — and the form had room for only one. Further confusing matters, her mothers had since split and married other women; they have six children among them. “It was so stressful and so frustrating to try to fit our family into those forms when so clearly it wasn’t going to fit,” said the student, who is now a senior at a university in Illinois and wanted to remain anonymous to keep her family’s financial affairs private. “You feel like you are lying no matter what you do.”

The aid form, the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, is the single most important document in determining how much and what type of financial aid students receive. But the form, informally called Fafsa, has not kept up with the changing composition of families, in large part because the federal agency that issues it has to abide by the Defense of Marriage Act, which recognizes only heterosexual marriage. Because these students cannot fully portray their family’s finances, the amount of aid they receive may not fairly reflect their needs. “In some cases, they are robbed of aid they would have otherwise received, and in other instances they benefit from it,” said Crosby Burns, special assistant for the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Research and Communications Project at the Center for American Progress, a research organization that recently published a report about these issues in the financial aid process.

This is not solely an issue for children of same-sex parents. Any children with unusual family circumstances — whether their parent is in jail, involved in a messy divorce or simply refuses to provide support — can have trouble filling out the form. No numbers are available on the number of students from gay and lesbian families who are affected, though Gary Gates, a demographer with the Williams Institute, which studies sexual orientation law and policy issues, has calculated that about 220,000 children under age 18 are being raised by same-sex parents.

Though it is not immediately clear from the actual form, officials from the Department of Education, which issues it, said that applicants with two married mothers or fathers must fill out the Fafsa as if the couple were divorced. They must choose the legal parent who provides more support, which means that the other parent’s income and assets are often ignored. That can give the impression that the student requires more aid — or less — than one from an identical family headed by heterosexual parents.

Applicants with same-sex partners, meanwhile, may not be able to include their spouses or other dependents on the form. Other gay students, who are now out on their own because their families have cut off support on learning about their sexual orientation, have difficulty establishing themselves as financially independent. (In some instances, however, colleges could choose to include more information provided by the student and include it in their calculations.) “Since most other financial aid depends on the application for federal aid, these distortions will trickle down throughout the entire financial aid application process, even outside the federal government’s support,” Mr. Burns said.

The section of the financial aid form that asks for parental information has two lines: one for the applicant’s father/stepfather and another for mother/stepmother. The form also asks for the parents’ marital status, as well as the applicant’s marital status, using the federal definition. “There is the stigma and indignity of having to list them as divorced, when they are, in fact, not,” said Emily Hecht-McGowan, director of public policy at the Family Equality Council, “It creates confusion and this extra step that children raised by L.G.B.T. parents have to go through,” she added referring to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals.

An undergraduate at Harvard, meanwhile, said his challenge was trying to figure out how to get financial aid while excluding his parents. He said that when he was home during winter break in his sophomore year, he told his parents he could not change his sexual orientation. His parents promptly decided to cut off their financial contribution to his studies, he said, and asked him to leave the family home. (The student wanted to remain anonymous to protect his parents’ identities.) He scraped together the last of his savings to get a plane ticket back to Harvard, and his resident dean helped him find a place to stay for the remainder of the break.

But figuring out how to pay tuition was a bigger hurdle. Students under the age of 24 generally must have their parents fill out the Fafsa, unless they can persuade their institution to grant them independent status, which colleges have the power to do. But the Harvard student said that he was told that the university typically required students to take two years off to be deemed independent. “When I first heard this, I was mildly panicking,” he said. “I had no idea what I could do for two years or where I could do it.”

Ultimately, the university agreed to grant him independent status, as long as he took out about $10,000 in total loans, kept a part-time job, and visited a counselor (which made him uncomfortable, since his only experience with therapists was with those who tried to convince him that he could change his sexuality). He was also required to get a letter from his parents explaining why they cut off financial support — something he knew he could not possibly do.

Eventually, Harvard relented and told him it would not require him to get the letter and allowed him to continue his studies. But college officials did urge him to take a short break to clear his head. “It was a pretty intense series of steps to get into this independent status,” he said. He is taking the current semester off, and will start his senior year in January. “I know if I had been at any other university, I would have had to drop out,” he said, since he had a support system that included his dean. Even so, “It was a pretty excruciating experience.”

Vincent Garcia, director of the scholar relations and selections program at the Point Foundation, which provides scholarships to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students, said he gets calls a couple of times a month from gay and lesbian campus directors, financial aid directors or students who were in similar situations. “The federal government has given the colleges the ability to declare the student independent, but they don’t want to tell them that from the outset because they don’t want to commit the financial aid dollars to someone who suddenly has so much financial need.”

Part of the problem, he said, is that many colleges do not have a protocol for dealing with these students, whether they are abandoned by their families or are from families like the Illinois student with two mothers. In his report, Mr. Burns suggested that the Department of Education investigate whether it could revise its policies to recognize families headed by same-sex couples without violating the Defense of Marriage Act. At the very least, he said, the department could issue guidelines and training materials to financial aid administrators to help the families.

Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of the FinAid and Fastweb Web sites, agreed that “the Fafsa does not provide a lot of guidance for students in such situations.” And if they qualify for less aid, this may make it more difficult for such students to enroll in and graduate from college. He added, “This is especially problematic for children of same-sex parents, since they are discriminated against through no fault of their own.”

“Dealing with gay students, bullying in very different ways”

Taken from: http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/12/us/minneapolis-bullying-schools/index.html

October 12, 2011

Minneapolis (CNN) – Jared Pettingill’s parents wanted a safe place for their son to attend school where he wouldn’t be harassed for being gay. They found that place in the Minneapolis Public School district. ”It’s just been really accepting in my experience,” says Jared, a high school junior. He says he’s “never really dealt with bullying issues” in middle school or high school. ”The amount of positive reaction to LGBT issues is really amazing.”

Minneapolis Public School administrators admit that by no means has bullying been eradicated from their schools. However, they firmly believe that they are leading the way in creating a safe environment for all students. In January, the school board unanimously passed a unique resolution instructing administrators to track bullying incidents related to the harassment of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students. The measure also requires all staff to be trained on LGBT issues. It injects LGBT topics into the curriculum, which includes adding an LGBT component to sex ed. They will eventually add an elective high school course on LGBT history.

Just a few miles away, another Minneapolis-area school district has attracted national attention for its policy that deals with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students much differently.

Neutral or not?

The Anoka-Hennepin School District, just outside the Twin Cities, made headlines in recent years after seven students committed suicide in 2009 and 2010. Parents and friends say four of those students were either gay, perceived to be gay or questioning their sexuality. They say, at least two of them were bullied because of their sexuality. The school district says there is no evidence that the suicides were linked to bullying.

Nevertheless, it stirred public debate over the school’s sexual orientation curriculum policy. The district’s curriculum policy, adopted in 2009, bars teachers from taking a position on homosexuality in the classroom and says such matters are best addressed outside of school. It’s become known as the neutrality policy. Anoka-Hennepin, which encompasses the Twin Cities’ northwestern suburbs and is the state’s largest school district, is the only Minnesota school district known to have such a policy.

In July, gay rights advocates filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of a group of students challenging the neutrality policy. The Southern Poverty Law Center and the National Center for Lesbian Rights told CNN that the lawsuit is currently in mediation. While the school district refrained from commenting on specifics in the lawsuit, it issued a statement in July noting that “Anoka-Hennepin has been recognized as a pro-active leader in the state of Minneosta on bullying prevention.” The school district is also in the middle of a federal investigation into “allegations of harassment and discrimination in the Anoka-Hennepin School District based on sex, including peer-on-peer harassment based on not conforming to gender stereotypes,” according to a district memo.

Superintendent Dennis Carlson says the neutrality policy — which has attracted just as many local supporters as it has critics to heated school board meetings — is a reasonable response to a divided community. ”It’s a diverse community,” Carlson told CNN earlier this year, “and what we’re trying to do, what I’m trying to do as a superintendent, is walk down the middle of the road.” The school district has a separate, comprehensive bullying prohibition policy, and Carlson said there is no link between the suicides and bullying. ”We have no evidence that bullying or harassment took place in any of those cases,” the superintendent said. Carlson emphasized students need to report bullying, and he acknowledged “gay students in our district struggle with bullying and harassment on a daily basis.”

Damon Fietek, 16, knows that all too well. He says he was a target for bullies because his father, a middle school teacher in the Anoka-Hennepin school district, is gay.

Damon’s story

Jefferson Fietek had adopted Damon just before he started high school. The bullying began immediately. Damon Fietek, pictured with his father Jefferson, says he’s been a target for bullies because his dad is gay. ”It upsets me a great deal,” says Fietek, a middle school theater teacher. “For him, being a kid from the foster system … I was just really upset that he wasn’t being allowed to celebrate the fact that he had a family now.”

Damon said the harassment went on for a full year before he even told his dad. ”Students would say stuff to me…like ‘Hey, did your dad rape you last night?’ You know, just make those kinds of jokes at me,” Damon said. The bullying wasn’t just directed at him. He says it was a general hostility toward people who are — or are perceived to be — LGBT or who come from homes where a family member may be LGBT. ”I pulled him out of [that school],” Fietek said.

Damon now attends another school in the Anoka-Hennepin district with smaller class sizes. He says he hasn’t had any problems. Fietek, an adviser to his school’s Gay Straight Alliance, says when he first started working at the school, several teachers suggested he keep his sexuality to himself for his own job security. He decided it didn’t make sense to keep quiet. Risking his job is a gamble he says he has to take because the issue is too important. ”I just compare it to what these kids’ personal stories are, and they’ve got stories far worse than anything that’s happening to me,” Fietek said.

In his adviser role, Fietek says he receives phone calls, texts and Facebook messages several times a week from students who feel like they are at a dead end because of bullying or uncertainty regarding their sexuality. Fietek believes the school district’s neutrality policy has indirectly taken the side of the bullies by not supporting these kids. ”Some of the things we’ve put in place [have] just created a scary environment,” Fietek said.

Making it better

James C. Burroughs II used to bully kids when he was in school, calling other boys “gay” for no particular reason. Jared Pettingill says he hasn’t experienced any bullying at his Minneapolis high school ”If you did something on the athletic field that wasn’t masculine or manly, you’d use the term ‘that’s gay’ or the ‘f’ word — the other ‘f’ word,” Burroughs recalled.

Today, Burroughs is the director of Minneapolis School District’s Office of Equity and Diversity, which seeks to “integrate equity, diversity, and inclusion into all aspects” of the school district. Burroughs says his past is why he believes so passionately in putting an end to bullying, particularly of students who are perceived to be gay. ”What’s important for me is acknowledging that that happened and making it better for another generation of students,” Burroughs said.

The Minneapolis School District has taken many steps to address the issue of bullying LGBT students, including training its staff on tracking bullying of these students, injecting LGBT topics into the curriculum, hosting an “Out4Good” LGBT support program, and implementing a bullying prevention curriculum called Second Step. ”It’s very special,” Burroughs said. “I think we’re a national leader when it comes to making sure that students and families in the school system K-12 are being treated and valued equally amongst all students.” Anti-bullying curriculum is woven into subjects like math, history and literature throughout each day, and staff from the teachers to the bus drivers are trained on how to create role play scenarios, says coordinator Julie Young-Burns. Ultimately it comes down to how each teacher feels they’re best able to infuse the lessons into their already planned lessons on other topics, she says.

High school junior Jared Pettingill says he notices bits and pieces of an LGBT inclusive curriculum on a regular basis. ”In my English class right now, at the end of the year we’re gonna be reading a book called ‘Giovanni’s Room,’ which is all about a bisexual character living in Paris, and it hinges on a lot of his relationships,” he said. ” And there are a couple of other books like that that deal with lesbianism.”

His parents support the school’s proactive stance in teaching tolerance and offering support of LGBT students like their son. However, they say any policy is ultimately “a piece of paper” that won’t work unless the message is embraced by everyone.”It is our public officials, it’s our media, it is each of us individually saying it’s not OK to be hurtful to somebody else,” said Marie Pettingill.”Whether its LGBT or other issues kids experience, they should be able to be safe, and we shouldn’t have to even think that we have to talk about that. Kids should be safe.”

“Racial Gap in School Suspensions Widens”

Taken from: http://www.theroot.com/views/black-students-face-harder-punishments-report-says?page=0,1&wpisrc=root_lightbox

October 12, 2011

“Black students are often removed from school for minor infractions, says a new report.”

What’s more, white students were disciplined most often for easily documented offenses, such as vandalism and use of explicit language, while black students were disproportionately disciplined for offenses that may have required more judgment on the part of the teacher, such as being disrespectful and being loud in class — suggesting that blacks may be singled out when it comes to more subjective infractions.

Jonathan Brice, Baltimore City Public Schools’ executive director of student support, argues that some in-school rule breaking should not result in suspensions. “You need zero tolerance for acts of violence or weapons on campus,” he says. “But that’s a small microcosm of what goes on in our schools on a daily basis.” Since minimizing out-of-school suspensions for minor offenses in 2004, Brice says, the school district has increased its graduation rate by 20 percent and decreased the dropout rate by almost half.

Although efforts to close the suspension gap are gaining momentum — in 2010 U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder publicly discussed the issue — various legislative loopholes and red tape have made both documenting and addressing the widening gap between black and white student suspensions particularly difficult. The report suggests that government intervention, more transparency and better record keeping by schools will improve discrepancies in discipline rates. Currently, many state agencies and school districts do not release racial breakdowns of their disciplinary records. The Individuals With Disabilities Education Act requires all states to make a pledge to collect and examine disciplinary data by race and ethnicity, but the information is not required to be — and often is not — released to the public.

“We have to end what I call the ‘Pledge of Illusions,’ ” Losen says. “We have to ask schools and districts their [suspension] rates.”

Ultimately, schools also need to examine how effective suspensions really are, he adds, suggesting that when it comes to certain infractions, putting kids out of school seems counterintuitive. “Truancy is one of the leading reasons for suspending kids. What is the deterrent value in suspending truant kids?”