Let’s be clear.
–Some parents at PS 282 oppose a new middle and high school going into their elementary school building on Sixth Avenue and Lincoln Place in Park Slope on grounds that it will overcrowd the school. The proposed school is called the Kalil Gibran International Academy. The parents would oppose the inclusion of any proposed middle or high school in their building.
—The Militant Islam Monitor opposes the Kalil Gibran International Academy on the crazy ground that it has a Jihadi agenda. They will oppose this school wherever it goes.
These are separate arguments. The parents will continue to oppose the new school going in. The MIM will also continue to oppose the school — but for very different reasons.
Including links to the MIM in a letter about a parent’s opposition to the school really muddies the waters.
Don’t you think?
Hi, why do we as human beings who was created by God always have to be bitter and so judgemental, Khalil Gibran a man with such passion and great knowledge does he not deserve a public / goverment school named after him.Who did he harm and just because his name sounds muslim he is being degraded, I to am Catholic with a muslim surname because my husbands dad is muslim and I thank God everyday that I live in South Africa where I am not judged, I will never leave my faith and I love other relegions that is call humility and if the world had more of that imagine what a better place this would be or and by the way I was 13years old when I 1st heard about Khalil Gibran as I used one of his quotes in a speech about the oppression of women and I quote “oh toiling women who labours in the house and out come on unite” unquote does those words sound like a terrorist to you? Please people educate yourselves before assuming the wrong.
This school is not going to be teaching multiculturalism and, at the very least, should not be subsidized by the city.
Check out http://www.pipelinenews.org/index.cfm?page=almontaser41907.htm among MANY other sources.
And sorry..I should have read something other than the cries of “NYC Board of Ed to open a school to teach children to be Talabanis” before I posted.
Aaahhh…The Right Wingers…
I read more about the school and I think it’s a wonderful idea. Thanks for setting me straight…
If Arabs are who these people who oppose the school on the grounds of it being a ‘Jihadi school’ fear, then they should remember the quote from Sun Tzu (The Art of War): “Know your enemy and know yourself, find naught in fear for 100 battles…”
I would prefer we teach our children about Arabic culture and teach them Arabic language so they may be better prepared for the future. Didn’t many of our problems that resulted in 9/11 come from the fact that our U.S. Intelligence Agencies and our government had too few Arabic language speakers working for them and no one to translate the information they were getting? Not enough Arabic speakers for other intelligence positions? Maybe this is a really smart move on the part of our school system.
And I doubt anyone said this school would be only for Arabic and/or Muslim children. Truthfully, with a name like “Kalil Gibran International Academy”, I don’t know that any hard core Muslim families would send their kids to the school. Baha was not well liked nor well treated in his native Persia or by The Muslims, and the school is not called “Mohammed The Prophet International Academy”. Mohammed is not ‘The Prophet’ Kalil Gibran was writing about.
** And maybe if we have a future generation with a little more knowledge of The Middle East and The Arabs and Arabic culture, etc. than the present one, then perhaps in the future, our government won’t have such a terribly screwed up foreign policy.
It’s not a Muslim school – it’s a NY city secular public high school – with a dual-language specialization. There are two other schools in NYC exactly like this one – a Chinese-English school and a Spanish-English school, both funded by New Visions.
No public high school can ever be religious. Why can’t people understand this?
And naming it after Khalil Gibran, who was indeed raised Catholic but was a humanist, shows the nature of the school and the thought that went into it by its planners.
Tina
I am extremely confused. Why would The NYC Dept. of Education open a Muslim school and name it “Kalil Gibran International Academy”??? Kalil Gibran was a Catholic, and his most famoud work, “The Prophet”, was about Abdul Baha, who started The Bahai Faith…and who was persecuted by Muslims.
I don’t get it. Maybe those at The Board of Ed should educate themselves…