Imperial County, Calif. school censors Harvey Milk presentation

[nclib]

http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/youth/39645prs20090520.html

Natalie Jones, a sixth grader at Mt. Woodson Elementary School in Ramona, California, was given an assignment in an independent study project class to write a report on any subject she found interesting.  She chose Harvey Milk.  Milk, the United States’s first openly gay elected official, was one of Time Magazine’s “Time 100 Heroes and Icons of the 20th Century” in 1999, has been the subject of several books, an opera, a documentary film that won the 1984 Academy Award for Documentary Feature, and a feature film released in 2008 that won two Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay and Best Actor.

After Natalie got a near-perfect score on her report, her class was told to make PowerPoint presentations about their reports, which they would show to other students in the class.  The day before Natalie was to give her 12-page presentation she was called into the principal’s office and told she couldn’t do so.

Wrongly citing a school policy on sex education, the school violated Natalie Jones’s free speech rights when it refused to allow her to give the presentation in class.  Instead, the school improperly required classmates to get parental permission to see the presentation during a lunch recess.  This illegal censorship of student speech violates both the First Amendment and the California Education Code and misuses a school policy in order to justify the censorship.

Status: The ACLU LGBT Project and the ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties sent a demand letter to the school on May 20, 2009.

-------

Crazy and shows how strict and misinterpreted sex education policies are. The presentation is linked, but for anyone who doesn't want to read it, other than saying Milk was gay, there was nothing else remotely sexually explicit.

[Associate Justice PiT]

     That is quite weird. Maybe they were afraid kids would get the idea that it is okay to be gay.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

In another 1-3 years, they're going to have to learn about how gays can legally get married again in California.

[7,052,770]

Despite what the elitists want to portray, bigotry is alive in all areas of the country.

[Eraserhead]

     That is quite weird. Maybe they were afraid kids would get the idea that it is okay to be gay.

How terrible.

[RI]

Imperial County trended hardest against gay marriage from 2000 of any California county.

[JSojourner]

The operative sentence in the article is -- She chose Harvey Milk.  The operative word being, "chose".

The only time I would, as an educator, become concerned about a student's choice of topics would be if that choice were something like Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy or Ed Gein.  Of course, even then -- if the student articulated a genuine interest in criminal psychology, and not in the titillating details of the criminal's behavior -- I would allow it.  Once in a great while, a student chooses a topic that cries out for intervention. 

Harvey Milk is NOT one of those by a long shot.

[minionofmidas]

     That is quite weird. Maybe they were afraid kids would get the idea that it is okay to be gay.

Maybe they were afraid that kids would get the idea that Democrats are gay, and become Republican as a result. This is Imperial County, after all.

[Sbane]

Umm this didn't happen in Imperial county. Ramona is basically exurban San Diego and it is in San Diego county. It's a sh**t town (yes I have passed through it) full of white and hispanic rednecks. Doesn't surprise me that this happened here.

[Coburn In 2012]

Shouldn't the school at least let the report happen and see what conclusion the student comes to?  I mean she could research this guy and discover he is really not the hero and martyr Hollyweird wants us to think he is.

[Scam of God]

Despite what the elitists want to portray, bigotry is alive in all areas of the country.

You are aware, are you not, that Imperial County is smack-dab in the center of the 'Inland Empire', and is culturally closer to the depths of Idaho or Utah than the coast?

Knock it off with your populist-pandering.

[nclib]

Student is Able to Read Report on Harvey Milk After Threat of ACLU Lawsuit Against School
      

Two weeks ago, we reported on sixth grader, Natalie Jones, who was censored by her Califonia school for trying to give a report on Harvey Milk. Now, we are happy to report that on Thursday Natalie was able to give her report, though only after the ACLU threatened her school with a lawsuit for censoring it.

The assignment, part of an independent research project class, was originally to prepare a written report on any topic. Jones chose to write about Harvey Milk after watching Sean Penn win an Academy Award for portraying him. Students were then told to make presentations about their reports, which they would show to other students in the class. The day before Natalie was to give her 12-page presentation she was called into the principal’s office and told she couldn’t do so.

Then, the school sent letters to parents of students in the class, explaining that Natalie's presentation was being rescheduled for a lunch recess and that students could only attend if they had parental permission due to the allegedly “sensitive” nature of the topic. School officials tried to justify all of this by claiming Jones’ presentation triggered the school’s sex education policy.

After the ACLU threatened to sue them for violating the First Amendment as well as the California Education Code, school officials finally backed down. Natalie received a written apology, and school officials sent a letter about that apology to all the parents who got the original “warning” about the presentation. The school also agreed to bring its sex education policy into compliance with state law, and acknowledged that the mere mention of a person’s sexual orientation isn’t enough to invoke sex education policy. And perhaps most important of all, Natalie gave her presentation to the entire class Thursday morning.

Natalie's mom, Bonnie, tells us it went really well. She’s terribly proud of her daughter, and we are too. But we suspect Harvey, if he were around today, might be proudest of all.

[Sbane]

Despite what the elitists want to portray, bigotry is alive in all areas of the country.

You are aware, are you not, that Imperial County is smack-dab in the center of the 'Inland Empire', and is culturally closer to the depths of Idaho or Utah than the coast?

Knock it off with your populist-pandering.

Again this didn't happen in Imperial county. Please sh**t on San Diego county if you must.

[Alcon]

Despite what the elitists want to portray, bigotry is alive in all areas of the country.

You are aware, are you not, that Imperial County is smack-dab in the center of the 'Inland Empire', and is culturally closer to the depths of Idaho or Utah than the coast?

Knock it off with your populist-pandering.

It's like you two are in a contest to see who can be wrongest, and you're both winning.

[7,052,770]

Despite what the elitists want to portray, bigotry is alive in all areas of the country.

You are aware, are you not, that Imperial County is smack-dab in the center of the 'Inland Empire', and is culturally closer to the depths of Idaho or Utah than the coast?

Knock it off with your populist-pandering.

It's like you two are in a contest to see who can be wrongest, and you're both winning.

I'm wrong that bigotry is alive in all parts of the country?

[Alcon]

Despite what the elitists want to portray, bigotry is alive in all areas of the country.

You are aware, are you not, that Imperial County is smack-dab in the center of the 'Inland Empire', and is culturally closer to the depths of Idaho or Utah than the coast?

Knock it off with your populist-pandering.

It's like you two are in a contest to see who can be wrongest, and you're both winning.

I'm wrong that bigotry is alive in all parts of the country?

No, it's not, although Ramona, California, is hardly a bastion of West Coast social liberalism.  And you might as well say Skinheadism is alive in all parts of the country; what belief isn't?

But in fairness, I did misread your post the first time around.  Looks like I'm in the running for that contest too.  Oh well; Einzige still wins.  He's confusing exurban San Diego County with Imperial County with Bakersfield with Utah (Oklahoma, dude?) and that's quite a feat.