Ear Hustle

Child Denied Right To Reference Jesus In Her Schoolwork Assignments

A Nevada charter school is in a bit of hot water for telling kids that mentioning Bible verses is against the law.

12 year-old Mackenzie Fraiser is a student at Somerset Academy. She was assigned to create a PowerPoint project titled “All About Me.’ Mackenzie is a Christian, and so she wanted to include a reference to John 3:16 in her presentation. But her teacher told the class that religious references were not allowed.

A few months later, Mackenzie had to do another project on self-esteem. She wanted to mention that she derived her self-esteem from having been made in the likeness of God.

sommerset academy

Once again, the teacher forbade the sixth grader from referencing the Almighty. The school sent the following email to Mackenzie’s father. They said the teacher “appropriately followed school law expectations by asking Mackenzie to choose an alternate quote for the presentation.”

So Mackenzie’s parents decided to contact the Liberty Institute, a law firm that specializes in religious liberty cases. Here’s attorney Jeremy Dys said the following:

“At the heart of this incident is that students are allowed and need to be allowed to express their beliefs – in their class assignments. If a school official tells students that their beliefs cannot be expressed in class assignments, it teaches them that religion is bad. This case really demonstrates why it is important to protect religious liberty.”

bible

So here’s what needs to happen. Somerset Academy needs to follow the law. They need to allow Mackenzie to redo her assignment with the Bible verses. And they need to apologize. If they fail to do so, the federal government should revoke their funding.

A few weeks ago the Department of Education threatened to withhold funding for any public school that did not protect the rights of transgender students. I believe schools should be held to the same standard for religious students.

Source: FOX

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