More Fake Hate…

This is hometown for me. I grew up just outside of Summerville, in Goose Creek.

This church was pretty nice, as I remember it. It was right on Main street.

What a shame

In the link here, notice they say this was the third attempt to burn the church down in a month.

JG

Anybody blogging on this (talk about stupidity in our school system):

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/gwinnett/0505/06neace.html

Gwinnett teacher who refused to alter grade is fired

By D. AILEEN DODD, MIKE MORRIS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 05/06/05
The Gwinnett County School Board voted early Friday to fire a Dacula High School science teacher who refused to raise the grade he gave a student athlete who appeared to be sleeping in class.

At the end of a Thursday night hearing that stretched into the early morning hours of Friday, the board decided by a 4-1 vote to terminate veteran physics teacher Larry Neace, school system spokeswoman Sloan Roach said.

Neace left the building after the ruling and would not comment.

His lawyers said they planned to appeal the dismissal to the State Board of Education within 30 days.

“These students lost a teacher who cared not only about their academic growth, but their growth as individuals,” said Deidre M. Stephens-Johnson, who represented Neace.

While the board agreed 5-0 that Neace violated school board policy by using grades as a disciplinary measure, board member Carol Boye, who represents Dacula High School, voted against the termination. She declined to comment on her vote.

School system spokeswoman Sloan Roach said she did not know when the termination would take effect. “He was already suspended with pay until the outcome of this hearing,” she said.

More than 200 students, parents and teachers packed Thursday night’s hearing to see whether Neace would lose his job.

Gwinnett school officials said Neace was barred from campus for insubordination after he repeatedly refused to comply with the district policy that prohibits using grades as discipline.

Neace, who has taught at Dacula High for 23 years, was removed from class after he refused to raise the grade he had given a football player on an overnight assignment. Neace said he cut the student’s perfect grade in half because he thought the student had fallen asleep at his desk the day the assignment was made.

“What we have in this case is a case of a pampered football athlete sleeping in class and being given favored treatment on an academic grade,” said Michael Kramer, another of Neace’s lawyers. “What we have here is the principal essentially attempting to coerce and intimidate a teacher.”

School officials said they gave Neace a chance to restore the football player’s grade. When he refused, they sent him home. He has not been allowed back at school since April 14, when he was told he could resign or face being fired.

Superintendent J. Alvin Wilbanks recommended to the board that Neace be fired. “He cannot have a policy that supersedes board policy,” Wilbanks said. “He had no right to do that.”

Neace said he had a practice of reducing the grades of students who waste time or sleep in class. His course syllabus warns that wasting class time can “earn a zero for a student on assignments or labs.” No administrators had previously complained about the practice, which he adopted more than a decade ago, Neace said.

Neace said during the hearing that he also noted another student appeared to be sleeping in class on the same day. It was not clear Thursday what happened with the other student’s grade.

School officials said Thursday that it appeared Neace allowed students to sleep in class. “He said it was not his job to wake up students,” Assistant Principal Donald Mason said.

When asked Thursday if students sleep in his class, Neace responded, “Very rarely.”

As school administrators presented their case to the school board, supporters of the teacher spilled over from the hearing room into a hallway outside. Some wore buttons saying “What’s Up Doc?” and Dacula junior Clark Hurst wore a shirt bearing the acronym SADD, for “Students Against Dumping Doc.”

Neace said he has been overwhelmed by the support he has received from students.

Posters calling for his return decorated the high school’s halls. Some students wore T-shirts protesting the principal’s action and passed out fliers saying, “Forget the whales, save Doc.” Students also circulated a petition asking administrators to reinstate Neace.

“It’s overwhelming — the support, the phone calls, the e-mails, the [editorials] in the paper,” Neace said Thursday afternoon. “I am getting support from all over the country. I got an e-mail from a professor at Rutgers University that said he wishes more teachers would do what I was doing, because it would make his job so much easier in the classroom if kids were prepared to take responsibility for what they do.”

Neace said he got the nickname “Doc” years ago because of an exercise he led in class. That day he wore a lab coat and a stethoscope as he took the blood pressure of students. “Somebody said, ‘Mr. Neace looks like a doctor,’ ” he said. “That was 22 years ago, and the name stuck.”

Dacula High parent Nancy Penn said she supports Neace’s methods. She said her daughter, a former student of Neace’s, understood and respected his practice of penalizing students who fall asleep in class.

“As a parent, if my student was falling asleep in class, I would be upset,” Penn said. “I do not have a problem with him using tactics to bring my student to attention in class. A teacher needs authority to govern his students. If someone takes away his authority, how can he manage his classroom?”

School officials said the issue was not that a student fell asleep in class. Instead, they said, Neace refused to abide by a school district policy that says, “Grading is not to be used for discipline purposes.”

LaShawn, would you believe that is my home church (but I live in Baltimore at the moment)? It is a Summerville historical landmark (over 100 years old, I think). My grandmother who still goes to that church is very upset. My mother is not all that happy either. I’ve only met this pastor once. I’m angry. I saw a picture of Bethel when I was looking at a blurb about it on FNC.

And I thought the other pastor who wanted to rebuild the church went too far…

At the moment, the pastor is accused of the crime. Let’s not pile on until we have more facts.

After what the last pastor did when he “had dreams of building a new church”, I’m a little on the “guilty until proven innocent” side. If he didn’t do it, that’s good. If he did, that’s bad. But one thing’s for certain. The next time I set foot in Bethel, it won’t be the same one I walked into for 15 years.

Three times someone tried to burn my church down? THREE TIMES?!

Joel, you made me cry (bad, bad Joel! ). I saw the aftermath on FNC, but to see my church burning like that broke my heart.

There is no doubt that there is an undercurrent of victimization that continues to permeate these acts. The unfortunate thing is that money is moreoften than not the ultimate motivator.

What really gets me riled up is the fact that this guy is a pastor. If you are the pastor of a church, you are the caretaker of a flock. Often in churches, folks get caught up with the pastors slick sermons, and not his real ability to care for the congregation.

the saddest part of all is he’ll probably get another congregation in the future.

LaShawn, nothing in the MSM link you provided points to race.

Dell G.
So whites can’t hate whites? Half-whites can’t hate whites? Your selective use of “facts and statistics” in an attepmt to persuade are silly. Your use of big words makes me guess you’re not a “real world” guy. I’ve seen your comments before. My guess is that you are a lawyer or paralegal. You work for the government or are in a union. I’ll bet you give strangers in their cars the finger too. Are you so confrontational in your real life as you are on the internet? I doubt it.

DS, I certainly hope you’re not suggesting I retract. You know good and well, as my grandmother used to say, the effect that pastor was hoping to have by burning down the church, insurance claim notwithstanding.

LB, you have not established a reason why the church was burned down.

It is established that they wanted a new building. The insurance money would provide some funds. Additionally, when something “bad” happens to a church, the church members tend to step up in giving to the chuch. This could have been an attempt by the pastor to get members to give money for the building.

For the “Black churches burning” blip a few years ago, many of the churches burned, that wasn’t race based, was because of insurance reasons. If I remember correctly, most fires of non-residence buildings are arson. Of those, most are believed to be insurance related.

I’ll concede your point if you can show where the pastor blamed whites for burning down the church.

Dell G.

Went to your site. No thanks, I don’t need any State Farm Insurance.

DS, due to a lot of older people who go to Bethel, the majority of the congregation did not want a new church. They didn’t want it then (when we had Rev. Washington), they don’t want it now. But now they have no choice.

Instead of the “hate-crime advocates”, perhaps the “Hate Crime Syndicate”, or “Hate Crime Brigade” is more apt.

D.S. I’m just looking at that last paragraph.

The fake hate I’m referring to is that directed at some of his flock.

Why would the pastor tell his people not to talk to the authorities?

Do you see it as him slandering some of his people for “spreading gossip” and “telling lies”?

I’m sure there’ll be more to come, even if the MSM doesn’t do it, I think Joel, Jade and others will soon get the rest of the story out.

The fake hate I’m referring to is that directed at some of his flock.

OK, now from reading “The Queen’s” comment:

He and his wife knew or had reason to know that people (especially the MEDIA) would attribute the act to “racism.”

I think “hate” is based on hate, as in race bias, crime. So, if you are stating it as just “hate” without the race bias, then I agree.

If you are stating, as “The Queen” is stating that is is race bias, then I disagree.

Comment #2.