School Board Reinstates Christian, Jewish Holidays In Fla. County

http://www.local6.com/news/5286217/detail.html


The local school board reinstated Good Friday, Easter Monday and Yom Kippur as school holidays after getting more than 3,500 e-mails from around the country criticizing its earlier decision to eliminate them rather than add a Muslim holiday.

The Hillsborough County School Board voted 5-2 Tuesday night to restore the holidays to the 2006-07 school calendar after a Muslim group said it didn't want its request to add the Islamic holiday Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of Ramadan, to result in Christian and Jewish holidays being taken away.

"It is a temporary solution," said Ahmed Bedier, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "We've been adamant the last two weeks that we would give up on our request for a holiday so the other religions won't lose theirs."

The board's earlier vote had resulted in denunciations on conservative and Christian talk radio shows nationwide, leading to the e-mail barrage and impassioned speeches at Tuesday's meeting asking that the holidays be restored.

I don't think there's a holiday out there that really, really needs kids before three p.m. If there was, "Easter Monday" wouildn't be one of them. There IS no Easter Monday holiday.

Screw it, put them all in school and keep them there.

which is a country with a Christian state religion, everyone actually has Easter Monday off. As well as Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Ascencion Thursday, and Whitsun Monday, and (halfday) Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. But pupils of other religions in school can apply and get 3 or 4 days off a year in connection with religious holidays - pretty much all Muslim pupils had Eid off, for example.

you get so many days off and nobody cares how you use it.

"Easter Monday" isn't a religious holiday: It's a Monday holiday following a Friday holiday. If the school district can't spare "Easter Monday" to accomodate another religious holiday, then somebody's got a lawsuit.

Easter Monday is a holiday, at least in Europe. The Irish Easter Rebellion actually started on Easter Monday.

Back when calendars were divided into saint's feasts, sure, there was a day you could call Easter Monday or Michaelmas or All Souls or St Joseph's or whatever.

There' isn't a religious Easter Monday holiday.

it lets people travel to be with family on the holiday and not have to travel on the holiday itself. but you're right, easter monday is not a religious holiday, it's one of convenience.

There should be no religious holidays in public schools. If you want to take Yom Kippur, or Eid, or Ash Wednesday off to spend time with your family for religious purposes, fine. Tests should not be scheduled for religious holidays, but besides that, deal.

honestly, is this that friggin difficult?

is also referred to as Dyngus Day
http://www.polamjournal.com/polka/dyngus.html

reasonable and appropriate request by the Muslims?

:shrug:

on the school calendar (no exams, quizzes, etc.).

Why not just accept the fact there are other religions out there and stop trying to make everyone fit into either Christian or Muslim?

What is the significance of that other then chocolate bunny hangover?

http://www.answers.com/topic/easter

In Western Christianity, Easter Day always falls on a Sunday between March 22 and April 25 inclusive. The following day, Easter Monday, is recognized as a legal holiday in most countries with a generally Christian tradition, but not as a rule in the United States, except formerly in a few states, all of which had dropped it by the 1980s.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter_Monday

Easter Monday is a Christian holiday celebrated the next day after Easter Sunday. Formerly, it was celebrated as Easter Week, but was reduced to a one day celebration in the 19th century. Celebration events include egg rolling competitions and dousing other people with water which, at one time, was holy water used to bless the house and food.
Easter Monday is also celebrated in the one U.S. state of North Carolina.

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

Well, it's a holiday, but it isn't religious.

gawd bless amurrica.

this same county allows kids out of school every year to attend the State Fair in February. And I thought 'Medevil Times' was a tourist trap in Orlando!

I can see letting kids out if there was a high degree of participation in the ag stuff for the State Fair. If they don't go or go for the corn dogs.....

it is sprawling suburbia.

Our biggest clubs was FFA, and lots of kids were in 4-H. Many of them showed animals, etc. I actually think this is great. Alot of my friends had alot of pride in those ribbons from the fair.

If Christian kids wanted to take good friday, or jewish kids yom kippur, they were excused. Why impose these celebrations on everybody?

and Yom Kippur (as well as the major Christian holidays). It was simply a matter of numbers: half of the teachers and half of the students were Jewish. If the schools stayed open, they couldn't get enough substitute teachers, a lot of students were absent, and nothing got done. It made more economic sense to just close the schools, and the year's school calendar took these days into consideration in planning the school year. No big deal. BTW, I didn't hear any of the Christian kids complaining about a day off.

I agree with the school boards original decision. Why should there be ANY religious holidays? Summer break, winter break, spring break. Thats it. Now go back to class!!:)

It makes a certain sense, little kiddies possibly walking to and from school in the dark, and all. ;)

is that people of a certain faith should be allowed to take religious holidays off from school with no penalties. As I recall, this is how my high school dealt with High Holy days for my Jewish classmates. Way back then, there were just Christians and Jews in my high school, except for one Muslim who came for a month (He was a Saudi whose parents were visiting the country and who wanted him to experience a US school.)-but it wasn't near Eid, so the matter didn't come up.

I am not making this up: At our area school districts, the first day of deer season is a holiday. No, they don't call it Deer Day, but everyone knows that a teacher work day in the fall is set for the first day of deer season. When we first moved to Arkansas, I didn't believe it. Now I'll believe anything. Almost.

they close school on the first day of deer season there as well

Even the City of Pittsburgh Schools had the First day of Deer Season off.

Remember the purpose of a School taking a "Holiday" is a recognition that a sizable part of its students and staff will take that day off. Thus the First Day of Deer Season makes sense. The same with real religious holidays, if a sizable number of students and teachers are going to be off that day, take it off. On the other hand if no one is taking it off have school that day.

One comment on Easter Monday. My high school was one of the last to take it off, but prior to the 1960s it was common to have the whole week after Easter off School. In the 1950s Collages started to be lobbied by Florida resorts to switch "Spring Break" from the Week after Easter to the Beginning of March, which was a dead time for the resorts. Thus Easter Break became Spring Break do to lobbing, and that is why most schools (including Collages) no longer have Easter Break.

Getting all of the holidays wouldn't hurt.

It's said that every religion has a piece of the truth, so all religions must be taken equally as truth. Hence all vacations must be taken as well.

didn't see what was so terribly wrong about letting the muslim kids have their holiday too. the response by the school board was extreme, to say the least

Those statements show a laudable tolerance and respect by that Muslim group for other religions. I'm assuming that's why rainbow4321 highlighted them.

Sheesh, I'm an atheist who is far beyond school age who has no kids and even I am impressed that this group did not blindly push their agenda at the expense of others. You don't see that every day.

Muslims NEVER get any of their holidays recognized in this country, and the smaller religions...ferget about it. What a bunch of bigots Americans are!

off.

I need to know!

Ramen.

In the "Good Old Days", Schools started the Tuesday after Labor Day, and ended sometime in June. Prior to the insitution of the 180 day school year (about 1900) you had even later school starts (For example New England schools did not start till after Thanksgiving, but I am talking about pre-1900s here).

With the adoption of 180 Mandatory School years, Schools started on the Tuesday after Labor Day (August was to hot) and ended about June 1st (In Pennsylvania and Maryland the first date to safety plant corn i.e. guaranteed date of no frost for at least three months). Urban Schools tended to go later. For Example the City of Pittsburgh Schools did not (and do not) end till about June 15th. This was the "norm" by the 1920s.

Now certain Holidays were observed. At first this was limited to Thanksgiving, and the day after Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter Week. IT was later expanded to include Columbus Day, Veteran's Day, George Washington's Birthday and Memorial Day. Snow days extended the schools years (School Strikes would NOT be a factor till the 1960s).

The problem became how to fit 180 days between Labor Day AND Memorial day? Snow days were an additional problem. The first big problem was that High School Students wanted to work during the summer, but found most jobs filled by students from schools the left out earlier (Mostly Collage Students). To give their children and "Edge" on getting Summer Jobs, Schools started to let out students earlier and earlier. You saw a retreat from June 15th back to Memorial Day. Snow days complicated the factor with most schools using Easter Week as a safety net, i.e. if schools were canceled do to Snow, you lost a day of Easter Vacation.

As the pressure to leave the Student out earlier and earlier built up, Easter Vacation started to be eliminated so that the Students could get out earlier in the School Year and have an edge to get a Summer job. Other Holidays were eliminated (Columbus and George Washington's Birthday) for the same reason (Remember I am talking about 1950 America here Martin Luther King Day was not adopted till the 1970s a were the various Jewish Holiday). This pressure built up so that School Districts in the 1970s started to start schools in the end of August (and in the South this has extended to the beginning of August).

On top of this Collages were lobbied to change their Easter Break to a Spring Break (i.e. move it from the week after Easter to the second week of March by Florida Motel interests starting in the 1950s). This extended to Some High Schools (Who ether made the same switch or used the fact Collages had "eliminated" Easter Break to eliminate their own Easter break, but in such school it was rare for them to institute a spring break through some did).

The above is the pressure from the 1920s to the 1970s and you saw a movement to August Start of Schools, a Movement to May for the end of School (Through this appears to be mostly a Movement in the American South), elimination of Easter Break (and NO adoption of Spring Break) and a reluctance to take any Holiday off except Christmas and Thanksgiving.

On top of this was the observation that if 10% of a School Teachers or Students were gone, you had a major disruption in learning (This corresponds with studies in other fields, basically a 10% loss can destroy the ability of any organization to perform, the classic cases tend to be military units buy you see it is private enterprise). Thus in any school that over a number of years has a 10% absence rate on a particular day, it is better for the students and the Schools just to take that day off. Thus you see the acceptance of Martin Luther King Day in Schools with at least 10% black or Minority population, while Columbus Day and George Washington's Birthdays are still school days.

The same with the Jewish Holidays, as more and more students took those holiday off, it became more and more clear that the School were being harmed and the Schools would be better off taking those days off. In Areas with high Catholic or main line Protestant Churches, Easter Monday has a similar problem (and First Day of Deer Season in Rural America is another Example).

Thus you have a clash of two pushes, one to eliminate ALL holidays during the School Year, the other to expand the number of Holidays.

One last note, on going to year around schools to "Solve" the above problems. Year around school have been kicked around for decades and consistently failed. The problem is how do you integrate students coming from outside the school? In Collage it is simple, you stay at the Collage, but in Grade School and High School you go to the School controlled by the School District YOUR PARENTS ARE LIVING IN. If your Parents move, you switch schools. When people talk about year around schools they tend to ignore such students for the problem is how do you integrate them into your school? If everyone school year end just before Summer and starts around Labor Day, you just move the student o the next grade. If you are moving into a School District that has a different ending or beginning how do you get integrated i.e. be at the same level as your fellow students? The answer is you don't. Some sort of plan has to be adopted for such students, plans the schools do not have the time or money to implement, thus I do NOT foresee year around school anytime soon for this problem is the problem that has to be solved WITHOUT interfering with people's concept their High School Student should be able to get a summer job.

All the vile spew you might expect from racist cretins. Most of them did not protest about losing "their" holidays--they just wanted to express their idiocy & hatred.

Let's hope the School District can at least allow an "extra" holiday for students to take as needed.

and the reaction to this has been embaressing. It's not like they were going to take away Christmas for chrissakes. From what I understood, the Muslim holiday was never going to be added to the calender, but Yom Kippur, Good Friday, and Easter Monday were going to be taken off. Parents (of all faiths) would then be allowed to take their children out of school for religious reasons 2-3 times per year without penalty. I think it would have been a good policy. A fair and tolerant policy. But, obviously, certain "Christians" are not interested in fairness and tolerance.
The intolerance and nastiness in this country that we have seen in the last few years make me so sad. I'm sure we'll be getting a Intelligent Design curriculum instituted soon!! Then, I'll have to send my daughter to Catholic school so she can learn about science!

Leaving Students take 2-3 days off a year for "Their" holidays does NOT address the problem of breaking the class cohesion when 10% of more of the Students are out of the Class room for ANY REASON. If the class is overwhelming Catholic you will see more than 10% of the class gone on Easter Monday AND WHATEVER IS TAUGHT WILL HAVE TO BE RE-TAUGHT THE NEXT DAY. The same if the class more than 10% Jewish or Moslem or even Wicca on their Religious Holidays (and let us NOT forget the Greatest National Holiday, the First day of Deer Season).

At the same time the School Board ideally wants the School year to start the day after Labor Day and end before Memorial Day. If you have to many holidays it just can not be done (and barely can be done with the few holidays most Schools are closed today). Europeans "solved" this problem by adopting August as their Vacation month, permitting Schools to be open in June and July. In the US, do to the fact the first student out in an area gets first choice on the Summer Jobs in the Area, the push has been to ending school in May (So far only in the American South, but the tread is spreading for the same reason, most school I know of still end their School year in June).

This is the problem more than religious intolerance. Do you give up Martin Luther King Day for a Moslem Holiday? Do you give up Yom Kipper for that holiday? Often the School Board believe they have no choice for if they extend the school year they get complaints from Parents (and if they extend the Start of the School year they get similar Complaints). Even the national Guard is a Factor, many Students join the National Guard in their Junior year, going to basic between their Junior and Senior Year and then their Military occupation training after their Graduate. These tend to be Mid-June to Mid-August schedules (and most National Guard training still takes place during the Summer for this same reason, less lily to disrupt the education and work schedule of their Soldiers, through ever so often every Unit has to have a Winter Camp).

My point here is this is NOT a "lets us have another Holiday" but what do you give up for that Holiday? Martin Luther King Day? Columbus Day? President's Day (Most school do NOT observe the last two)? Deer Season? Thanksgiving and Christmas tend to be off the table but these tend to be family holidays, but if permit the Christmas Break than do you extend the year or start the year early? That is the problem, how to divide the year and frankly I believe we may have to have Congress make the Decision given that we want adults (who tend to be parents) to be able to move from one part of the Country to another. The only way to do that is uniform School years and only Congress can impose such uniform School Years.