Today I got some interesting news…
Being the day before the application to the National Honor Society is due, I was scrambling to find information and advice as to how I should fill it out. When I asked my guidance counselor, he told me — rather simply — that I wasn’t going to get in. He told me not to even bother filling out the application. I asked why…and he said that my GPA wasn’t high enough.
When he said that I sort of thought he was kidding; my GPA is (or was) high enough and I had actually started to raise it in the beginning of this semester. As I looked at him he told me the problem:
It turns out that my public school is choosing not to recognize 3 full credits from my old school because those credits are considered “religious” and therefore not valid. The class being rejected was named simply “Bible”. My guidance counselor told me if it was named anything else, it would probably get accepted…but with a name like “Bible”, they won’t take it.
Wait. What? How does this work? So it is okay to offer classes which explore the religions of East (a class they actually offer at my public school), but not recognize classes offered by other schools because they talk about Christianity?
Because of them rejecting these credits, I don’t get the GPA credit and therefore my GPA fell just enough to put me .03 points below the standards for National Honor Society. I now won’t get into Honor Society in time to put it on my college applications which could affect how some colleges look at my application.
I’m really starting to wonder how far people are going to take the idea of political correctness and separation of church and state — an idea that is basically developing into separation of Christianity and state and not necessarily other religions. There would never be a public school in the United States that, in their right mind, would deny credits to someone who took a class teaching the Koran. If they did, they would have the biggest lawsuit on their hands. But because it was a Christian class, no one cares that it’s unfair.
yeah that sucks. i could’ve graduated a whole year early but for that same problem.
hmm this sounds like an editorial idea for a school newspaper. what is separation of church and state, where is it in the constitution, what does it really mean, is it actually possible, and which religions are and are not being “separated”? is there an “affirmative action” policy for certain religions that have been “slighted” for the last 200 years?
didn’t you get on honor society last year tho?
I don’t think I can write about separation of church and state in the paper…usually they say stay away from religion in general. But I can give it a shot.
I wasn’t in honor society last year.
Even though the US considers itself the “free-est” nation on earth, there are underlying injustices which can really knock the wind out of you. I would consider arranging a meeting with the principal and outlining the extent of their hypocrisy (in a gentle and loving way). Surely they cannot fail to see that when faced with it. After all it is religious study, not a church service with prayer.
Sheesh this stuff makes my blood boil!!
yeah i can imagine you’d be asked to stay away from talking about religion in the paper.
another thing you could try would be a letter from the alcs principal or bible teacher showing the academic side of the class…bring that to your guidance counselor and ask if you can do anything about getting those credits counted.