Queens school officials banned a student play this month out of fear that it was too critical of outgoing Schools Chancellor Joel Klein and Mayor Bloomberg.
The Jamaica High School and Queens Collegiate students wrote the play after reading the Greek tragedy "Antigone" in a course called "The Actors Studio," taught at Queensborough Community College.
The play paints a picture of unequal treatment at the two schools, which share one building. Collegiate is a new and growing school, while the Education Department is trying to close Jamaica for poor performance.
Instructor Brian Pickett received an email the day before the performance that principals at both schools had decided to ban it.
"They both had issues with the script and are concerned about implications and negative references to the [Education Department] as well as the chancellor and mayor," the email stated.
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Neither principal could be reached during the holiday week, and the Education Department declined to comment.
In a letter to Klein and Bloomberg last week, Student Press Law Center director Frank LoMonte wrote, "It is difficult to think of a more educationally and civically unsound action that a principal could take than to order students to refrain from speaking out on a matter of public concern regarding the quality of education they are receiving."
"I felt it was discriminatory," said Jamaica senior Afsan Quayyum, 18. "I had a lot of hope about this play. I wanted everyone to know what we face in the school every day. It was our story."
If the students had written a play that bashed teachers and unions, exalted Joel Klein and Michelle Rhee, and payed homage to Mayor Bloomberg, everything would have been fine.
Silly high school students - say the right things about the right people and get paid a billion-fold...say the wrong things about the right people and get censured.
Therein lies the REAL life lesson of the Wrath of Klein.
Real dissent is dead in this fascist corporate state we live in...Where's the outrage over Cuomo basically pardoning this sleazy Bloomber punk Rattner from being prosecuted? They let him off nearly on New Year's eve not to draw attention...? Putin would be proud of stuff like this...Did you notice how the new governor basically pardoned A Mr. Rattner the other day? Rattner, a Bloomberg cronie was caught red handed giving a 1 million dollar bribe to the Hevesi state pension fiasco...yet walks away with a 10 million dollar fine, BUT NO ADMISSION OF GUILT! HE SHOULD BE GOING TO JAIL...!!!
ReplyDelete"He drove a hard bargain. Former Obama administration "car czar" Steven Rattner yesterday walked away from his collision with Attorney General Andrew Cuomo by agreeing to a $10 million fine and a five-year ban on appearing before any state-pension funds. But Rattner, who headed the massive government bailout of General Motors and Chrysler, admitted no wrongdoing in the massive "pay-to-play" pension scandal that led to the criminal convictions of former state Comptroller Alan Hevesi and seven others."
Next play...CityTime, A Model For Value-added Economic Inflation
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