Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Georgia Law Review
Publication Date
1998
Volume
32
First Page
633
Abstract
(Excerpt)
In recent years, with increasing frequency, the media has drawn national attention to communities caught in gridlock over value conflicts in the schools. From Lake County, Florida, where a conservative Christian school board required teaching that American culture is superior to others, to New York City, where a controversial multicultural curriculum and the now infamous book Heather Has Two Mommies precipitated the Chancellor's downfall, these stories capture our imagination. Nevertheless, regardless of where we stand on the political spectrum, we often dismiss such compelling conflicts as isolated and distant incidents, never to be replicated with any real or lasting force in or near our own community. Since the media typically presents these as bipolar disputes, we seldom comprehend the complexity of the underlying controversies or their broad implications for schooling. Except for the most politically aware, few readers consciously connect these dramas with those played out in Congress and state legislatures over proposals to return prayer to the public schools or to carve parental rights expressly into federal and state statutory law and state constitutions. Outside of the law and policy community, few Americans link these stories to the even more remote yet related national debate over educational reform, including charter schools' and voucher proposals.