Middle school teacher burns American flags in class

[jerry611]

A Stuart Middle School teacher has been removed from the classroom after he burned two American flags in class during a lesson on freedom of speech, Jefferson County Public Schools officials said.

Dan Holden, who teaches seventh-grade social studies, burned small flags in two different classes Friday and asked students to write an opinion paper about it, district spokeswoman Lauren Roberts said.

A teacher in the school district since 1979, Holden has been temporarily reassigned to non-instructional duties pending a district investigation. The district also alerted city fire officials, who are conducting their own investigation.
"Certainly we're concerned about the safety aspect," Roberts said, along with "the judgment of using that type of demonstration in a class."

Pat Summers, whose daughter was in Holden's class, said he was among more than 20 parents upset about the incident at school yesterday. Holden apparently told the students to ask their parents what they thought about the lesson, he said.
"She said, 'Our teacher burned a flag.' I'm like, 'What?' " Summers said. "When I was (at the school) at 8 a.m., the lobby was filled with probably 25 or 30 parents" who were upset, he said.

http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060822/NEWS01/608220378

[barb162]

1. Maybe he'll burn a bunch of books and newspapers

to demonstrate freedom of the press.

[libhill]

4. Hell -

if he did that, the ass wipes would probably give him a medal and promote him to Superintendent of Schools....

[barb162]

6. Yikes, don't say that

[liberaldemocrat7]

71. The teacher should have taken a larger flag then ripped it up

to demonstrate the notion of free speech.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

31. Eh.

It's immoral to burn books.

[barb162]

33. I feel the same!

But if he wanted to burn the National Enquirer I probably wouldn't object

[libhill]

35. But but but -

enquiring minds wanna know why?

[barb162]

37. Don't make me laugh!!!!!

you bad

[libhill]

38. All the news

that's fit to keep the sheeple sleeping... a fine publication - :)

[Eric J in MN]

2. He made a class non-boring.

Fire him! Social studies must be boring.
(sarcasm)

[NMMNG]

3. Maybe he should have burned a couple of rainbow flags

They would have given him an award for sure. :sarcasm:

[cynatnite]

5. I applaud the teacher...

Getting kids to think and express themselves. That's what a teacher should be doing.

[Mugsy]

48. Agreed.

He said it was "a lesson in free speech".

Then the children saw their teacher dragged out in handcuffs.

Boy did they ever get a lesson in "free speech"!

[hootinholler]

65. Handcuffs?!?

C'mon, knock it off, he wasn't dragged off in handcuffs.

-Hoot

[NYdemocrat089]

67. I agree.

His burning of the flag probably brought great emotion to his students and enabled them to really think about whether or not they support the burning of the American flag.

I don't see the big deal, it isn't like he stood up there and said, "I hate America," and burned the flags. He was trying to get the kids to express themselves.

[DRoseDARs]

7. Unless this was a science experiment under controlled conditions...

...there is NO excuse for lighting fires on school grounds. While I commend the teacher for wanting to engage his students in livelier debate, this was a boneheaded way of doing it.

[Kiouni]

8. ahh come on

they were little flags :sarcasm:

[Bunny]

15. I agree. He was a fool for starting a fire inside a school full of kids.

He should have taken the class to the parking lot for his demo, which I think was an excellent teaching tool, BTW. He showed bad judgment doing it inside the school.

[cornermouse]

17. Better do away with all the chemistry classes then.

Bunsen burners are a controlled fire, which is what I am sure the flags were. Due to chemicals being used, they could potentially be a much greater source of fire danger.

[DRoseDARs]

23. That's quite the leap you're making...

This wasn't a science experiment and I seriously doubt it was done in a lab. He would have to get permission from the school administrators in order to make use of a lab and as such would have to explain why a social studies teacher needs to use a lab in the first place, ergo explain his intention to burn flags to prompt discussion.

[cornermouse]

39. No bigger than the leap you made.

A very small flag, which if I remember correctly is what this was supposed to be, isn't likely to be much bigger or out of control than the bunson burner. And let's just be blunt. Your supposition is that a teacher who is living on a teacher's salary, a teacher with 27 years experience teaching no less, is going to go out and buy two full sized flags out of his own pocket (schools don't pay for the basics anymore and I'm sure he wasn't expecting reimbursement)to blithely set on fire in the classroom... Yeah. Right.

[DRoseDARs]

50. And another leap...

:eyes:

Small fires always have the ability to turn into large fires. It was reckless to endanger the students like this if it was done inside the building other than in a lab. And who said anything about this guy's salary? And what the fuck does it have to do with this discussion?

[cornermouse]

64. Well, if you can't go from A to B even with neon arrows pointing

the way, then I'm afraid I can't help you.

[DRoseDARs]

73. You must've fingers in your ears and be singing "la-la-la can't HEAR you"

It isn't at all conceivable to you that the teacher isn't in the wrong based solely on the fact he's been a teacher for 27 years so he MUST be saintly and wise? I can imagine no school that would allow fires to be set on school grounds without explicit permission for approved curriculums from the administration, and that goes for science classes too. A curriculum has to be cleared and for a science class in a lab room, controlled fires and chemicals are often a given... but not in a social studies classroom and not by a social studies teacher. Just because he's been a teacher for 27 years DOES NOT mean he can set fires whenever without permission. Seniority does not give you the right to do whatever any more than signing statements make it legal to violate federal law and the constitutional.

[Bunny]

26. Yes, but chemistry classes are controlled situations with appropriate

extinguishing materials readily available, and the teacher presumably well-versed in the dangers of chemical reactions and the safety precautions required. I doubt if a social studies classroom has the same precautions - I'm not as sure the flag fires were controlled as you seem to believe.

[cornermouse]

40. The teacher had 27 years experience.

If he was an idiot the kids would have heckled and badgered him out of being a teacher long ago. Pay isn't all that high when you consider the job requirements.

[Bunny]

43. Well, I have no idea what that has to do with my post, and I have

no intentions of arguing about it.

[cornermouse]

44. Okay. Let me put it this way.

1. Does your school have fire sprinklers installed in their classrooms? I strongly suspect there isn't a school in this country which does NOT have sprinklers installed.

2. The flags were by all accounts quite small and since the teacher is almost certainly the person who bought them on his salary to be burned, its not likely he spent more than $2 or $3, is it? Especially with fire sprinklers which I am sure he knew very well were there.

3. The teacher has been there 27 years so he's not an idiot because if he was, tenured or not the school district would have found a way to be rid of him.

Your apparent contention is that the school teacher is an idiot. I explained to you why you are wrong.

[proud2BlibKansan]

53. There are no sprinklers in my classroom

and no fire extinguisher either.

[DRoseDARs]

54. Well, all three of your points have been demolished.

1. Buildings (and schools) catch fire all the time IN SPITE of their sprinkler systems.
2a. Small fires can easily turn into big ones.
2b. His salary is irrelevant.
3. Teachers can be in the system for decades and be utter idiots. Seniority isn't limited to the good ones...

[Donald Ian Rankin]

49. Really, really not true.

I've come across a good many teachers who'd been doing it for decades and were still awful.

If anything, I'd say that in general *on average* (by *no* means uniformly) newer teachers are better, at least here in the UK - they're more likely to be enthusiastic, and teacher training here has changed radically in the last few decades.

[Sherman A1]

16. Agreed

The lesson could have been taught in another means and still gotten the message across.

[proud2BlibKansan]

52. Agreed

[evox]

9. I'm curious

What exactly was his motive by doing such thing.

[tkmorris]

10. To make students THINK

I thought this guy was an idiot when I first heard about this, but after thinking about it I have to admit that he at least got an awful lot of bored kids (and their parents) to actually think about free speech, Constitutional rights, and the limits that may (or may not) be necessary and desirable. Imagine how many conversations took place between those kids about whether such an act is actually speech, the expressing of thought, or whether it should be a prosecutable crime.

I think there is an inherent problem in being an educator. The best of them are almost always controversial in some fashion. They have to be, in order to provoke discussion and thought. Controversy however always results in angry parents assailing the principals and school boards.

I used to find myself getting upset by teachers who introduced religion or conservative politics into the class. Then I realized that it was these very classes my kids were getting the most out of, because they got emotionally involved. As long as their is some balance to the issues presented, I think it works.

[agentkgb]

25. Yeah

Talking about it would have people pretending to think about it until the bell rings. Burning a flag will make you actually think about it.

[CATagious]

11. his motive is in the first 2 sentences:

"A Stuart Middle School teacher has been removed from the classroom after he burned two American flags in class during a lesson on freedom of speech, Jefferson County Public Schools officials said.

Dan Holden, who teaches seventh-grade social studies, burned small flags in two different classes Friday and asked students to write an opinion paper about it, district spokeswoman Lauren Roberts said."


I think he could have just told them to write a paper on the subject. But, I'd like to know how big the flags were. If they were those little paper flags that you wave at a 4th of July parade, then maybe not that big a deal.... of course, the media is not going tell us that because that might diminish their headlines and outrage.

[libhill]

12. Screw them and their outrage -

if they want to show outrage, they can get off their useless chicken shit asses and show some outrage over Gitmo, and the rape of our Constitutional rights. The media in this country is a pathetic joke...

[RC]

22. Right ON!

:patriot: :thumbsup::woohoo:

[cornermouse]

13. I suspect he was trying to teach the children about

freedom of speech and different ways of expression. It looks like the parents and school will be teaching the children the increasing lack of freedom of speech. Lesson in reverse as it were.

A couple of key statements from the article that you may have missed. He's been a teacher in the school district for a long time... 27 years. He probably has a good track record.

"Roberts said the flag burning did not appear to be politically motivated, based on an interview with Holden." Roberts being the district's "spokesperson".

[The Straight Story]

14. The second hand smoke would be enough to imprison him

thesedays...

[B Calm]

18. The small flags, were they made in China? I think it should be

against the law to display american flags that were made somewhere other than the USA! If it was made overseas, then it's our patriotic duty to burn them!

[kurth]

19. Some teachers fuck their students

This flag-burning epidemic has got to be stopped by a constitutional amendment.

[kurth]

20. delete - dup

[rock]

21. Excellent demonstation of the "freedom of speech"

I hope the kids are paying attention.

[LWolf]

24. Poor judgement, to say the least.

He had to know exactly what reaction he would get from parents, community, and school board. He had to know that he's not likely to spend the rest of his working life in the classroom. That's an awfully expensive "demonstration," and a really stupid one, in this middle school teacher's opinion.

They can nail him on the safety issue alone. Then there is the ethical issue of neutrality. He can't exactly claim to be neutral on flag-burning; if he considered the flag sacred, he wouldn't have burned it.

"Demonstrating" free speech by inciting a flame-fest, pun intended, by parents, leaving the school board to play fire fighters, accomplishes nothing productive.

He could have accomplished his means by bringing in newspaper articles, with pictures, of people burning the flag, perhaps some editorials or comments from the burners and those opposed, to expose students to the issue without the flames.

[ComerPerro]

28. From a safety standpoint, this was idiotic

and I don't know what this guy was thinking, he is going to lose his job.

[KurtNYC]

30. The VFW certainly considers flags sacred and

here is what they say:

Section 8k of the Flag Code (see below) states, "The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning." We recommend that you contact your local VFW Chapter and ask them for help properly disposing of your flag. And be sure to consider providing a small donation to them for their assistance.

http://www.ushistory.org/betsy/flagetiq.html

They also had this example of a violation:

In July 2003 President Bush autographed a small flag. This picture was circulated across the Internet noting its violation of the Flag Code: "The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature." Click picture for enlargement. Photo credit: AP Photo/Charles Dharapak

[CollegeDUer]

27. I think the teacher was fine but should watch out for safety reasons

I think this kind of freethinking is exactly what we need in school. But is he allowed to burn things like that in class?

[rug]

29. Good for him.

He should have followed it with a video of Baghdad burning.

[Blue_Tires]

32. k+r

[earth mom]

34. Wow, he was actually trying to TEACH his students-imagine that.

And get them to USE their brains. I think what he did is awesome and we need more teachers who get kids to use critical thinking skills! This country would be a lot better if this was the case in EVERY school.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

36. Good for him. Silence is the best ally of fascism.

A good demonstration of what the 1st Amendment actually means.

[3121guitarist]

41. Not a smart person, here.

The teacher knew what he was doing. He knows what he did would never go down in America. Flag burning is just bad taste at best.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

42. It may be bad taste at best.

But it's also freedom of speech at its best.

Sacred cows make the best hamburger.

[Horse with no Name]

45. So in science lab

How do they light the Bunsen burners?
I remember a science teacher putting something on his arm (can't remember what it was) and lighting it--demonstrating that it didn't burn him.
I guess that fire is only illegal in schools when it is convenient.

[proud2BlibKansan]

57. Science labs have safety features that other classrooms don't

like fire resistant fixtures and fire extinguishers.

[brentspeak]

46. He's a contender for the Idiot of the Week award

All he had to do to discuss the issue in class was show photographs of people burning the flag. I'm 100% against making flag-burning a criminal offense, but I'm also 100% against actually burning the flag (ie. if you burn the flag, I don't believe you should be prosecuted; but I'll consider you a jerk). He'll probably get fired for this, and deservedly so.

[Eric J in MN]

47. Let's say it was a mistake to do this wihout clearing it

..with the principal.

It still isn't a mistake which deserves a one-strike-and-you're-out punishment of firing him.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

55. Posted in wrong place, reposted and deleted .NT

.NT

[proud2BlibKansan]

58. Yes it does

Fire in a classroom is a great way to lose your job.

[Eric J in MN]

59. If he lit a candle, would you want him fired? NT

NT

[proud2BlibKansan]

61. Not my decision

But I do think he should be disciplined. I have been at a school that had a fire. It wasn't the least bit fun.

[Eric J in MN]

66. Was that fire caused by a teacher lighting something in

...a classroom demonstration?

[proud2BlibKansan]

68. no it was electrical

[Eric J in MN]

76. I think that most adults are able to light something

...in a classroom demonstration without a great risk of a major fire.

[proud2BlibKansan]

78. Doesn't matter

It is illegal.

[Quantess]

72. It does sound like a fire hazard.

Now, if he had taken the class outdoors to see their pyromaniac teacher burn a flag, then that would be at least less of a fire hazard.
That sounds like a silly lesson plan, too, though.

Photos of flag-burning, along with discussion, would have covered the topic in a less disruptive manner.

[proud2BlibKansan]

51. Great idea but dumb move

Fire codes prohibit burning anything in a classroom. We can't even burn candles.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

56. Some thoughts:

:-I have no problems with the sentiment expressed by burning an American flag.

:-I do not approve of teachers using their positions to make political statements. Teaching children to think about issues is one thing; supporting a particular position on them is quite another.

:-American schools include a pledge of allegiance every day, I believe. I think this is a clear example of abuse of position - schools ought to be apolitical (although here in the UK we're meant to have "a daily act of collective worship of a broadly Christian nature", which is clearly even worse).

:-Burning a flag in a classroom is clearly not necessarily a fire risk *if* he took the relevant precautions, although it's probably still a bad precedent.

:-Inspiring school children to burn flags clearly *is* a fire risk; if he did it he should have included a very clear "kids, don't try this at home."

:-I think ripping up a flag would have been a far wiser demonstration of the same point.

:-What this guy did is clearly far less of an abuse of position than what Jay Bennish, the teacher who got in to trouble for giving a long and overtly political lecture to his class in place of an actual lesson, and got massive support on DU, some time ago, did.

[Solon]

70. What political statement did he make?

This is what I'm trying to figure out, he burned two, small, U.S. flags in class, and then asked the students to write a paper expressing how they feel about that. Oh, he also said that burning the flag was freedom of speech, which is settled law, BTW. So again, what political statement did he make?

Also, just another note, the pledge of allegience, as a compulsionary practice, hasn't been allowed in a LONG time, thank the Jehovah Witnesses for that.

[and-justice-for-all]

60. Whats the big damn deal??!

Is the flag that the teacher burned the ONLY one we had left???

[Generator]

62. If this was really the America I had an illusion it was

until (yes still waking up, denial is hard to shake) the four thousand lies of 9/11 or the Calcutta like streets of New Orleans, and Black people actually go to vote/have their vote counted in elections (just for starters)-well anyhoo-if this was another America I thought it was-this wouldn't be a big deal at all. Because you see-Americans-the point of the symbol is what it represents. Not the THING itself.NOT a piece of fabric. It's a symbol. You cannot harm a symbol unless it's hollow. Is it? IF this was the country I thought it was no one would be bothered by the burning of the flag. Now, they might be bothered by fake elections, wiretapping, terrorist attacks that aren't answered for, things like that. But NO! This is the WORST thing that could happen to these poor sheltered children. And why do the more symbols one has on one's being or object (FOX news, the Republican's lapels) mean you are the opposite of the thing you are supposed to represent? In other words, burn baby burn. It's the least we can do. And I do mean the very least. WOW, freedom of speech. I didn't know they had to teach that. America, what a concept.


Meanwhile, hey kids-sign up here for the next war based on lies to make the rich richer. No problemo. God Bless America and flag burning is wrong because freedom isn't free. You bet your ass it isn't. Get over to Iran stat, kids. That war should be ready just in time when you get out of school and that teacher will be a long distant memory with no pension to help. I love America!!!!!!!

[walldude]

63. Great another excuse to ignore the real problems of the world

OMG A teacher burned a flag attached to a toothpick, STOP THE PRESSES!!!!! :eyes:

[Bozita]

69. Mike Webb talking about this teacher now -- stream link

http://stream2.mikewebb.org:8001/listen.pls

[cooolandrew]

74. Forget flags

In the range of issues burning flags, holding them upside down is so irrelevant. We just need to get away from flags, once america has a more respectable reputation again, flags will be cool again but in the range of issues it is a non issue. A distraction from the real problems.

[Quantess]

75. "A distraction from the real problems."

Yes! Thank you!

Flag burning is a big, fat, vacuuous, non-issue. A red herring distraction. Thanks for reminding us, and welcome to DU!

[ariellyn]

77. Welcome to Amurikka. n/t