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Schools

A perfect storm: religion, culture, timing

All three came together to turn Hillsborough schools' secular calendar into a hot-button issue.

By MELANIE AVE
Published November 8, 2005

Holy Day Holidays Should Hillsborough schools restore religious holidays? Yes, the district should respect all religions No, schools should set a secular calendar I don't know, too much political maneuvering going on

TAMPA - Hillsborough County school officials say no issue in recent memory has generated more controversy than the decision to remove religious holidays from the school calendar.

The county school board has received hundreds of e-mails since its vote two weeks ago. National and local media are peppering officials almost daily with interview requests. Other elected leaders are criticizing the decision.

"This has become divisive in ways we never intended or imagined," said superintendent MaryEllen Elia, who wants the board to reverse its decision tonight and restore the holidays to next year's calendar.

But why has this issue touched such a nerve locally and nationally? Many school districts, including Pinellas County five years ago, severed their connection between religious holidays and student vacations with little or no fanfare.

Scholars and observers say the key reasons are religion, culture and timing.

The fact that a Muslim group's request for a holiday sparked the calendar change made the issue particularly contentious. The Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly has focused on the involvement of Muslims, many of whom objected to the removal of all religious holidays and fought to keep Jewish and Christian observances on the calendar.

"To the average person, the misinformed person, they're thinking the Muslims somehow are responsible for Christians and Jews losing their holidays," said Ahmed Bedier, Florida director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

"They're thinking, how dare the School Board get rid of holidays for the Muslims. If this was a Baptist group coming forward, we would not be having this conversation."

When University of Florida Islamic studies professor Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons heard board members had removed every religious holiday except Christmas, she said: "Wow."

Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, many Americans have viewed Islam as a violent religion, she said. News stories about the war in Iraq and Muslim insurgents killing American soldiers have made the religion even less popular.

In Tampa, the trial of former University of South Florida professor Sami Al-Arian, a Muslim who is accused of financing terrorist attacks, has been under way for more than five months.

The School Board, Simmons said, probably didn't consider its decision in the larger context. "I don't think they were thinking," she said. "We are in the South, and religion, I think, is still very important for the southern part of our country."

Bishop Chuck Leigh, pastor of the Apostolic Catholic Church in Tampa, said he was invited to speak on O'Reilly's show but was turned away after he refused to say the secular calendar was an affront to Christians.

"I said this is more of an attack on Muslims," he said. "If it had been anything but the Muslims, it never would have appeared in the press and on TV and certainly not on national TV. It's become nothing more than a way to justify hate."

On Oct. 25, a majority of the School Board approved an academic calendar for 2006-07 that eliminated vacation days coinciding with Yom Kippur, Good Friday and the Monday after Easter. The only religious holiday left on the calendar was Christmas, which falls during the district's winter break. The religious days would be replaced with time off for Washington's birthday in February and two days near the end of the school year.

The vote came one year after a request from Bedier that students be given a day off for Eid al-Fitr, the end of the 30-day fasting period of Ramadan. The district's calendar committee studied the issue but approved a secular calendar instead. The only dissent came from the committee's lone Muslim.

As of Monday, only two of the seven board members - Jack Lamb and Jennifer Faliero - said they would vote for the more religious calendar. Lamb had voted for the secular calendar; Faliero against it.

Most board members, including chairwoman Candy Olson, said they are undecided. But they agree with the superintendent that too many people, particularly board members and administrators, have become preoccupied with the issue to the exclusion of educating children.

The distraction factor is the reason Elia is recommending the board reconsider the calendar and research the holiday issue in more depth.

Faliero, the only board member who supported keeping the religious holidays, including the Muslim holy day, said the experience has shown her the extent of people's bigotry toward Islam. She has received more than 600 e-mails.

Others pushing for religious holidays, such as Hillsborough Commissioner Brian Blair and City Council member Shawn Harrison, opposed a day off for Muslims. They said Christian and Jewish days are part of the nation's "Judeo-Christian" heritage.

Religious leaders estimate the number of Muslims living in Hillsborough is about the same as the Jewish population, with each accounting for about 1 to 2 percent of residents.

"The people who are saying go back to your country are absolutely saying you don't have the same rights as I do because your skin is a different color," Faliero said. "I want to know: What does an American look like?"

It was the American culture and way of life that drew Harrison, a Christian, into the issue. Last week, he tried unsuccessfully to get the City Council to pass a resolution asking the School Board to restore the religious holidays. The County Commission already had taken such a vote.

"This one was personal," said Harrison, who has a third-grader at Hunter's Green Elementary School. "Recognizing different religious and cultural backgrounds is important for a well-rounded education."

He said the board's secular calendar was simply "political correctness."

"I think I speak for a lot of people in this community when I say enough is enough," Harrison said. "Common sense is losing out because we are so deathly afraid of offending anybody."

As for a Muslim holiday on the calendar?

"I don't think we're there as a community or a society," Harrison said. "I don't think anybody would foreclose that as a possibility someday."

--Times researcher Cathy Wos contributed to this report.

[Last modified November 8, 2005, 05:14:12]