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Post by Art Vandelay on Nov 8, 2011 5:32:31 GMT -5
I do not care for school districts giving religious holidays off...be it Eid al-Adha, Yom Kippur, or Good Friday. If you believe an invisible sky-daddy is going to punish you for not doing whatever on a certain day, public policy should not have to bend towards that. The Jewish holidays are especially obnoxious...my school district would often give one day off for Yom Kippur and two days off for Rosh Hashanha, in September when people are just beginning to get back into the groove of the school year. If 20% of the population believes that they need to skip school to do more important things like talk to invisible beings, then they can not show up to school and make up the work that they missed later. Out of my extreme generosity and compassion, I will even go so far as to allow these absences to be considered "excused" and instruct teachers not to give tests on these days. I have to say I agree with this. Schooling always comes before imaginary friends, not the other way around. If you really must prioritise the latter, than you can take a hit to your attendance record. |
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Post by scotsgit on Nov 8, 2011 6:02:35 GMT -5
quote] the government's death panel Death panels![/quote] Is that anything like the panel I'm putting up in the bathroom? |
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Post by Meshakhad on Nov 8, 2011 6:27:39 GMT -5
I do not care for school districts giving religious holidays off...be it Eid al-Adha, Yom Kippur, or Good Friday. If you believe an invisible sky-daddy is going to punish you for not doing whatever on a certain day, public policy should not have to bend towards that. The Jewish holidays are especially obnoxious...my school district would often give one day off for Yom Kippur and two days off for Rosh Hashanah, in September when people are just beginning to get back into the groove of the school year. If 20% of the population believes that they need to skip school to do more important things like talk to invisible beings, then they can not show up to school and make up the work that they missed later. Out of my extreme generosity and compassion, I will even go so far as to allow these absences to be considered "excused" and instruct teachers not to give tests on these days. The problem is that if a large proportion of the school is going to miss those days, the other students will be affected. Not only can you not have tests, but you can't have labs, or cover vital material. And if you have teachers taking the day off, then you have to arrange for substitutes. In the end, unless you want to screw over the religious students, that day has to become unimportant, one that anyone could skip without difficulty. It's easier to just give the entire school the day off - and then tack on another day to the school calendar. If you only have a handful of students who will be observing a particular religious holiday, then yes, you shouldn't make it a school holiday. In middle school, there were only four Jewish students that I knew of (myself included). We informed the teachers in advance, and we were not penalized for not attending on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. I would consider it unfair to be forced to choose between following my beliefs and getting good grades in school. For a secular example, imagine if your school didn't let you take time off to vote in an election, and there was no way to compromise. When you complain, they point out that most of the students don't vote, and say "If you really must prioritize your political beliefs, you can take a hit to your attendance record." |
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Post by cestlefun17 on Nov 8, 2011 9:47:18 GMT -5
Of course you can give tests and labs and cover vital material. You choose your religious "obligations" over school obligations, but you will have to make up your work.
You can do both: again, you'll have to take the personal responsibility to make sure you make up your work.
I recognize that there is an eventual percentage where it becomes more burdensome to open the school than to close it (say if 95% of the people do not plan on showing up). But if you have a 20% Muslim population, and a 20% Jewish population, and a 20% Catholic population, you can easily rack up at least 10 holidays you need to grant.
I would leave to vote, come back to school immediately after, and make sure that I made up any work I missed. Although a major difference is that being a secular example, it is applicable to everyone in the community, and that voting only takes a limited amount of time rather than a whole day (and can be done by different people at different times), and not to mention that polls close long after the school day has ended.
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Post by N. De Plume on Nov 8, 2011 10:55:47 GMT -5
I recognize that there is an eventual percentage where it becomes more burdensome to open the school than to close it (say if 95% of the people do not plan on showing up). But if you have a 20% Muslim population, and a 20% Jewish population, and a 20% Catholic population, you can easily rack up at least 10 holidays you need to grant. For this situation, I think some sort of “floating holiday” system similar to what you get from employers who actually bother to give vacation days might be useful. |
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Post by Vene on Nov 8, 2011 11:30:40 GMT -5
Cestle, the major problem is that if a certain percentage of the student body doesn't show up for school, then they are legally required to make up the day as if it was a snow day or any other day off. At that point, the school district is just going to give the day off. Even assuming your argument is valid, the school district can't do anything other than officially give the day off.
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Post by cestlefun17 on Nov 8, 2011 12:47:03 GMT -5
I have never heard of such a law. If it is indeed true, then obviously whatever percentage would trigger a mandatory make-up day should be the percentage used when determining which religious holidays to grant.
Right, that's what I'm saying. Not showing up to school for these holidays should be considered an excused absence (with a signed note from a member of the clergy showing that the student actually was engaged in religious practice), and allow students to make up any work they missed without any negative consequences.
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Post by Vene on Nov 8, 2011 12:59:17 GMT -5
At the very least, that was the law in Michigan when I went to school there and it was also the reason why we had the opening day of deer hunting season off every year. It could potentially be different in Massachusetts, but considering they said in the article the rationale for the policy was due to student attendance, I find it unlikely.
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Post by N. De Plume on Nov 8, 2011 13:10:59 GMT -5
Not showing up to school for these holidays should be considered an excused absence (with a signed note from a member of the clergy showing that the student actually was engaged in religious practice), and allow students to make up any work they missed without any negative consequences. Not certain about the signed note bit. Religious holidays don’t always involve clergy—especially for less “organized” faiths. In the interest of fairness, I also think a few discretionary holidays should be available to non-believers of any flavor. And they would definitely not have clergy to write them notes. A signed note from a parent or guardian should be used instead. At the very least, that was the law in Michigan when I went to school there and it was also the reason why we had the opening day of deer hunting season off every year. It could potentially be different in Massachusetts, but considering they said in the article the rationale for the policy was due to student attendance, I find it unlikely. There can be enough logistical problems that a mass holiday could justify closing down the school, even without a mandatory make-up day. Especially if there are enough Muslim faculty members. I wouldn’t assume anything about make-up days without further evidence. |
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Post by The Lazy One on Nov 8, 2011 18:09:04 GMT -5
Seriously? People are giving the school board shit for getting a day off? Really?
When I was in school, the teachers and students wouldn't care why they got the day off, as long as they got the day off.
Also, where I went to school, it was mandatory for schools to excuse students on their religious holidays. You could not be penalized for missing school due to a religious or cultural obligation.
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Post by tgrwulf on Nov 8, 2011 20:13:38 GMT -5
Moments like this make me proud of my state.
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Post by Art Vandelay on Nov 9, 2011 2:09:56 GMT -5
I would consider it unfair to be forced to choose between following my beliefs and getting good grades in school. For a secular example, imagine if your school didn't let you take time off to vote in an election, and there was no way to compromise. When you complain, they point out that most of the students don't vote, and say "If you really must prioritize your political beliefs, you can take a hit to your attendance record." If religious ceremonies or whatever had actual tangible consequences as voting, I may be inclined to accept that you have a point. Since it doesn't, however, I must say that I stand by my statement. |
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Post by cestlefun17 on Nov 9, 2011 3:16:43 GMT -5
Even if a religious holiday doesn't involve going to a place of worship, I don't think it would be unreasonable to ask for a note from a clergy member attesting that this person is actually a devout member of this faith and would be required to miss school on this day. It's a little bit more of a pain to get than a note from a parent (which if we are not going to require a clergy note should at least be required), meaning you better be serious about this if you're going to miss school.
If everyone gets the holiday off then there is no need to give nonsense "religious holidays" to non-religious people: everybody gets the day off. And if only religious people are given certain holidays off as excused absences (in which they'll still have to make up the work they missed anyway) there is no need to be "fair:" these aren't supposed to be fun vacation days for these people, so it's not like atheists and non-religious people are "missing out" on anything.
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Post by Yla on Nov 9, 2011 6:59:42 GMT -5
Of course you can give tests and labs and cover vital material. You choose your religious "obligations" over school obligations, but you will have to make up your work. You can do both: again, you'll have to take the personal responsibility to make sure you make up your work. I know that personal responsibility is one of your favourite arguments, but children aren't adults. It doesn't work. The school can say 'well, it's your problem' all they want, but if the children end up lagging behind, then the school failed to fulfill its purpose. Through little fault of its own, but that doesn't change it. A compromise like this is preferable. Indeed. You can't do it for everyone and any holidays. |
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Post by N. De Plume on Nov 9, 2011 9:51:00 GMT -5
Even if a religious holiday doesn't involve going to a place of worship, I don't think it would be unreasonable to ask for a note from a clergy member attesting that this person is actually a devout member of this faith and would be required to miss school on this day. It's a little bit more of a pain to get than a note from a parent (which if we are not going to require a clergy note should at least be required), meaning you better be serious about this if you're going to miss school. I am not seeing how it is more of a pain to get a note from a parent. Most parents can easily attest to the whereabouts of their children on days off like this. They only have a few children that need notes, whereas a pastor (or equivalent) for a large church (or equivalent) could wind up with a hundred or more children—it would be quite a pain for him to sign all those notes. On the other extreme, if your family the only member of a particular faith in the area, it could require quite the road trip to obtain a note from an appropriate clergy member. And then there is the possibility of less organized faith that do not have much, if any official clergy, such as Quakers—who is supposed to sign the notes then? Furthermore, if you are serious about only accepting notes from clergy, then you would need a system in place to verify that the people writing these notes are indeed from actual clergy. Whereas if you are only requiring a note from a parent or guardian, the school should already have appropriate records to match those notes against. The point is that under this system not everyone is getting the day off. Instead, certain groups are more-or-less allowed to pick certain days off. If, just for the sake of example, we were to abolish all current breaks and impose this floating religious holiday system, then there would be little difference between a day of religious worship and a fun vacation day for all the Christians that took off on December 25. Furthermore, non-believer does not necessarily equate to non-spiritual. Some non-believers may find the option of a day off for some meditation to be useful. If nothing else, whether or not fairness actually enters into the equation, sometimes you need to simply avoid the appearance of unfairness. Just for the sake of morale. |
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