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Writer's pictureJoanne Jacobs

Trump’s inauguration: Safe for kids?


“Every peaceful transition of power is a historic moment,” a fourth-grade teacher in Michigan told parents in an email. Brett Meteyer will let students watch the inauguration, but not Donald Trump’s inaugural speech. He fears “inflammatory and degrading comments about minorities, women, and the disabled” and “profanity.”

As it turned out, the speech was G rated with a “we the people” theme.

President Trump criticized an  “education system flush with cash but which leaves our young and beautiful students deprived of all knowledge.” (Deprived of “all” knowledge?) What does that mean for education policy? No new federal spending initiatives, I guess, so it will be hard for the feds to promote knowledge over skills.

A Tennessee high school won’t let teachers air the inauguration in any class, complains Fox commentator Todd Starnes.

Suzanne Roberts, a parent, complained to the principal.

“She told me that Independence High School is going to focus on learning and moving forward and staying on curriculum and they would not be stopping class for the inauguration,” Mrs. Roberts said. “She told me that news happens every day in this country and they won’t be stopping class to watch the news.”

Greenville County (S.C.) Schools will let parents opt their children out of inauguration viewing. Officials say opt-outs were offered for past inaugurations.

In deep blue Oakland and Berkeley, California, a group of teachers and students called for schools to cancel classes to protest Trump’s inauguration, reports KTVU.

“This is an emergency,” said Yvette Felarca, a Berkeley teacher and organizer with the group By Any Means Necessary. “The lives of our young people are at stake.”

Students should watch the inauguration, writes Rebecca Gruber on PopSugar. It’s “not a sign of support” for Trump. “It is a sign that you believe in our democracy.”

Kids need to see that President Barack Obama and President-elect Trump will ride from the White House to the Capitol together with their wives seated by their sides. They need to see that the military doesn’t need to intervene to place our nation’s new leader in power. They need to see that our elected officials (minus those who are boycotting) come together on the Capitol’s balcony every four years. They need to hear Donald Trump take the oath of office and learn what those 35 words represent. This is civics at its best. There is also a civics lesson to be learned in the power of the First Amendment, allowing protesters to speak their minds simultaneously.

If her children don’t get to watch the inauguration in school, she’ll watch it with them at home, she writes. “I’m setting my DVR and already have a few books picked out that explain midterm elections.”

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