Free Republic

I had to read American literature in both high school and college. I read Mark Twain, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Louisa May Alcott, Jack London, Maya Angelou, Herman Melville, John Knowles, J.D. Salinger, and many other famous American writers. Some I liked; some I didn’t like. What I invariably hated was how English teachers approached them, picking them apart to the point of inanity (and, in my day, always with an eye to sexual symbolism). However, none of my teachers used those books to advance Marxism. At Harvard, though, things have changed, with the American novel being used as a platform for...

A group of radical pro-Palestinian activists took over a building at the University of California Berkeley on Wednesday, just hours after administrators and protesters struck a deal to end a weeks-long “encampment.” The Daily Californian, the UC Berkeley student newspaper, reported: A group of pro-Palestine protesters broke in and took over Anna Head Alumnae Hall on Wednesday afternoon. The protesters — gathering in a group of about 30 by 3:15 p.m. — hung up the Palestinian flag as well as boards reading “Free Gaza” and “Avenge Al Shifa.” [Al-Shifa is a hospital in Gaza that was taken over by terrorists,...

* Keante Harris, an assistant principal at McAdory Middle, was cuffed Wednesday * His arrest stemmed from the January 2013 murders of two men and a woman * The three were lured to a home and tortured by Harris and others, cops said ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ An Alabama middle school principal has been arrested and charged in the cold-case deaths of three people that occurred more than a decade ago. Keante Harris, an assistant principal at McAdory Middle School, surrendered to the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office Wednesday, on a fugitive of justice warrant. His arrest stemmed from the January 2013 murders of...

A former gym teacher reached a settlement with a California public school district, after claiming she was wrongfully fired when she refused to lie to parents about their child's pronoun preference and hide her religious beliefs. Jessica Tapia will receive $360,000 from the Jurupa Unified School District after she was fired in 2022 and accused of proselytizing during class. The teacher said the district accused her of not calling a student by their preferred pronouns, but denies ever being asked by a student to do so in the first place. She claimed the district directed her to refer to students...

A Utah school has sparked fury after removing the name of a student who died of cancer just months before graduation - despite completing all requirements. Samantha Corey, who was battling a rare and terminal form of the disease, passed away before she could finish her senior year at American Fork High School. As Samantha's siblings prepared to stand in her place, they were told by the district they wouldn't be permitted. Her name was also omitted from the ceremony. It wasn't like we were wanting special treatment for her,' Kimberly Corey, Samantha's mother, said to FOX13. 'I just think...

Here is yet another example of why our educational system is in such a sorry state. Back in February, high school teacher Warren Smith went viral after being asked by a student: "Do you still like [J.K. Rowling's] work, despite her bigoted opinions?" The conversation that followed was a masterclass in the Socratic method and critical thinking. In it, he asked a series of questions that forced the student to think critically about the assumptions he was making. Here is the brilliant exchange. (AT LINK) I've devoted four years of my life to this school, and yesterday it was like...

A ten-year-old boy took his own life after suffering horrific bullying at school, with his family saying he had warned officials 20 times about the ongoing abuse. Sammy Teusch, from Greenfield, Indiana, died by suicide on May 5 and according to his family, was being bullied up until the night he passed away. His parents Sam and Nichole say he was both physically and emotionally bullied at school, with Sammy being recently beaten up on a school bus. The bullying started last year when he was in elementary school, and followed him to Greenfield Intermediate School. According to the family,...

A Florida principal and self-proclaimed 'beacon of integrity and faith,' is in police custody after he was recorded choking, slapping and whipping a student with a charging cable at the private school where he worked. Dontay Prophet, 33, was imprisoned as recently as the summer of 2023 when he violated probation in relation to a separate charge of sexual abuse of a child. Prophet is the principal of the Destiny Leadership Academy in Ocala, just north west of Orlando. The horrifying footage was recorded on May 10. He was arrested just a day later. Video captured by security cameras and...

The 2023-2024 school year is closing on a sour note. No one should be surprised. Numerous colleges are cancelling their commencement exercises. Where they don’t cancel them; numerous graduating students are choosing not to attend, out of safety fears. And on Sunday, May 12, comedian Jerry Seinfeld – as inoffensive a speaker as one can imagine in a politically-charged time – stood up to give an address at Duke University’s commencement ceremony, and hundreds of attendees booed him, with dozens walking out of the event in protest. (Just how many of these were graduating students, faculty and administrators versus how...

A California dad has blasted his son's school for giving the child a book about a transgender boy - then allegedly forcing him to explain it to kindergartners. Carlos Encinas' 11-year-old son was assigned to read a book called 'My Shadow is Pink' in his fifth-grade class on May 1 at La Costa Heights Elementary School in Carlsbad north of San Diego. The book centers around a boy who describes his father's shadow as 'big' and 'blue' and his dilemma with his own shadow, which he feels is pink. 'My heart skips a beat as I put on a dress,'...

It is now an aged joke among those on the right that last month's conspiracy theories are this month's headlines. I humbly add to that maxim: "The present left-wing tantrums will become future regrets." ... PJ Media, along with a host of other conservative outlets was on a list of dangerous "pro-Israel" sites.. the list would come in handy when it came time for prosecuting people for genocide. ... People like this .. are cheering the chaos and destruction on college campuses and waiting with bated breath for the fundamental transformation of America to be complete. ... Alito's address: Right...

The City of Seattle has long been a laboratory for the radical Left. Activists experiment with concepts, language, techniques, and policies that eventually appear in other cities. For this reason, Seattle law enforcement often gets early insight into the evolving tactics of left-wing street protesters. The city’s officers have had decades of experience dealing with Black Lives Matter, Antifa, and anarchist movements, which culminated in the George Floyd riots of 2020. To understand the latest chaos at American universities, I spoke with Christopher Young, who served as an officer and detective for the Seattle Police Department, including working undercover for...

History gives us conviction and guidance. Today, as we watch ravaging antisemitism and the defacing of the American flag on university campuses, prevalent examples in history of courage and bravery should spur us to respond.In 1942, German medical student Hans Scholl was awakened to the persecution of Jews in the Western world. While serving on the Eastern Front, Scholl and his war buddies, Willi Graf and Alexander Schmorell, witnessed firsthand the Nazis’ murder of innocent Polish Jewish civilians.Scholl committed to exposing the evil being done against the Jewish population. Together with Graf, Schmorell, Sophia Scholl, and Christoph Probst, he began...

An anti-Israel student tore up her diploma during her commencement ceremony last Friday. Tarsis Salome was one of several students who came to the ceremony wearing zip ties on their hands in protest against the university's decision to remove the tent encampment set up on the Columbia campus last month. The protesting students also carried pro-Palestinian signs. Salome tore her diploma to shreds immediately upon receiving it. Another student appeared to have the name of senior Hamas official Mazen Jamal Al-Natsheh written on her cap as she accepted her diploma, the New York Post reported. The Students for Justice in...

Ronn Torossian, Jews are not safe in New York State - at Syracuse U., INN, May 9, 2024 Our greatest nightmares as Jews are coming true. It is happening again. Op-ed. Ronn Torossian is an American public relations executive, and president, Syracuse Jewish Parents Council ... On Saturday, on Holocaust Eve, a Jewish Syracuse U. student was beaten by a trespasser yelling “Heil Hitler” and no arrests were made. The day before, professors at the on-campus encampment distributed flyers saying, “Flood the Gates Escalate” and “We will not disavow any actions taken to escalate the struggle, including militant direct actions....

We've been keeping you up to date on the Princeton hunger strikers and it just got even funnier. We knew it would, but this is even better than we'd imagined. We were sure they'd wimp out not long into their stunt, but they're quitting AND claiming they're not quitting.

Students at Princeton University protesting Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza have called an end to their hunger strike after just 10 days. Princeton Divest Now, the student protest group that is calling for the New Jersey Ivy League university to divest from America’s Middle Eastern ally due to the high civilian death toll in the Gaza Strip, said additional strikers would be continuing their efforts.

The pressure on the Biden regime over its ostensible but hollow (at best) support for Israel has been high for months. The regime’s betrayal of Israel has been widely explained as a capitulation to threats from Muslim leaders that Old Joe would receive no Muslim votes in November unless he stabbed the Jewish state in the back. That consideration likely had a great deal to do with the betrayal, but the pressure also comes from within the regime: his handlers have appointed Muslim Brotherhood-linked haters of Israel to numerous positions of influence, and that influence is being felt.The pressures from...

Good news on the lawfare front: one of the largest American law firms, Greenberg Traurig, has taken on the case of nine survivors of the October 7 attacks, both Americans and Israelis and has just filed a lawsuit on their behalf against both the National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) and its parent organization, AJP Educational Foundation, Inc., also known as American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), for being collaborators with, and propagandists for, Hamas. More on this lawsuit, which is going to cause all sorts of trouble for the NSJP and the AMP, including the likelihood of an enormous...

Canary Mission has accused some 250 US students and academics of supporting terrorism or spreading antisemitism and hatred of Israel since October 7 Weeks after attending a pro-Palestinian demonstration, Egyptian-American student Layla Sayed received a text message from a friend drawing her attention to a website dedicated to exposing people it says promote hatred of Jews and Israel. “I think they found you from the protest,” the friend wrote. When Sayed visited the site, called Canary Mission, she found a photo from the October 16 anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian rally at the University of Pennsylvania with red arrows pointing to her...