Oliver KoppellHe voted "no" earlier this morning on a resolution asking the state to allow the city Department of Education to close city schools on two Muslim holidays. His was the only "no" vote.
I first saw this on PolitickerNY, who first saw it on Gotham Schools' Twitter.
"I just feel that we can’t, we shouldn’t deprive kids of school," said Mr. Koppell. "And we should make accommodation for everybody’s religious observance."
In fact, he in effect said, asking the state to add two more days off for religious observance pushes the city farther down a slippery slope.
The city is taking a similar tack in reducing the number of alternate-side parking days to accommodate religious observance.
Reducing school days or alternate-side parking days until everyone's holidays were recognized would be onerous, he said.
"I regret it," said Mr. Koppell, "because I think we should expand as I say the policies that we have to allow kids freedom to practice their religion."
He has asked his counsel, he said, to draft legislation that would call on the state to ensure that any city schoolchild who needs to take a day off for religious observance would not be penalized; allow for make-up exams for children who miss exams thanks to religious observance; and require city schools to take religious observance days into consideration when scheduling major events.
And he thinks the city should "consider" revoking days off on Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and Good Friday.
He stopped at Christmas.
"Well, Christmas, I think, is celebrated by so many people we probably shouldn’t change that," he said.
7 comments:
Sadly, what a racist!
The Catholic League asks why public schools display Jewish and Muslim religious symbols every December, but not Christian ones. See http://www.catholicleague.org/release.php?id=1634
Isn't this what the First Amendment was designed against, showing preference for some religions over others?
I'm not against showing the display of Muslim and Jewish symbols, but they should include Christian ones (and others if the need arises).
The proposed legislation sounds good. But to vote against the Muslim holidays, while failing to actively challenge the Christian and Jewish ones, just looks like he's picking on an easy target.
The schools are closed on Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Easter and Christmas, etc. not because of the student population, but because of the staff. Administrators, teachers, aides, DOE staff, custodians, bus drivers, etc. would want those days off to such an enourmous degree that for efficiency the schools close. Indeed, many of the "minor" Jewish holidays when work is prohibited, but which are not observed by many Jews are not school holidays at all. There is no showing that there is a similar staff demand for the Muslim holidays and given the educational crisis in this country, we can use all the school days we can get.
Christmas is a religous holiday, despite the crass commercialization of it, however it's also a federal holiday. Public schools, banks, govt offices, etc are always closed on federal holidays.
Just another indication of Koppells decreasing mental status which points to an organic health problem such as early onset Alzheimers or related dementia. It's an open secret that Oliver seems "off" the last couple years. Can we really afford another term with this dinosaur?
Koppell and Bloomberg's concern over the length of the New York City school year is valid - most countries with excellent educational systems send their students to school for much longer each year than the United States does. But, they are confounding two separate issues: the issue of which religious holidays are acknowledged and the problem of students spending too little time in school. Refusing to add Eid Ul-Adha and Eid Ul-Fitr, two of the most important Muslim holidays to the calendar will hinder the many positive effects that representing diversity can have on our city’s students.
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