Knuckle under buckle boy

I often question America’s education system, even though I have spent plenty of time in it.

So much energy gets directed toward things that have nothing to do with “education” and to action that affronts learning.

The latest example comes from a lawsuit making its way through the Tennessee courts, a suit against the Anderson County School Board and several county education officials. It serves as another testament to the way school administrators can find evil lurking behind every kid’s locker or in this case, every kid’s belt buckle.

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Costs of campaigning bring First Amendment questions

The debate about where one person’s freedom of speech begins and another’s ends always crops up during elections.

On one side, First Amendment proponents say that government should place no restrictions on the political speech called campaigning, even if the speech comes at a cost few can afford.

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That crazy thing called 'freedom'

I give a questionnaire each semester to my “Introduction to News Writing and Reporting” class to get to know students better.

“Who was your best teacher and why?” “What rumors have you heard about me?” “John Lennon or John Mayer?”

A few semesters back, I included this question: “What should happen to someone in this class who gets caught cheating?”

With the answers came the expected penalties such as a failing grade on the assignment, some kind of extra work involving ethical decision making and ousting the culprit from class.

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BONG HiTS 4 JESUS

The way Clarence Thomas sees it, “As originally understood, the Constitution does not afford students a right to free speech in public schools.” In the old days, says the associate justice of the United States Supreme Court, student liberties were mostly limited to sitting down and keeping quiet, and that was good for them. He was writing last June in Morse et al. v. Frederick, the “BONG HiTS 4 JESUS” case.

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Should the US Remove Religion From Its National Symbols

iCitizenForum talks about citizenship with Colonial Williamsburg interns.

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“By the People: Citizenship in the 21st Century”