From other Sites on the Line: 14 May 08

Voted by Fox News at GOP Hub.

Latest Muslim Outrage on
Campus:

You won't believe who they're targeting now

Cross posted from Crusader Rabbit:
http://crusader-rabbit.blogspot.com/2008/05/islamic-savages-win-again.html

Islamic savages win again
by MK

St. Cloud Times - A St. Cloud State University student in a teacher-training program at Technical High School left the school in late April because he says he feared for the safety of his service dog. The school district calls it a misunderstanding, and officials there say they hoped Tyler Hurd, a 23-year-old junior from Mahtomedi who aspires to teach special education, would continue his training in the district. Hurd said a student threatened to kill his service dog named Emmitt. The black lab is trained to protect Hurd when he has seizures. The threat came from a Somali student who is Muslim, according to Hurd, St. Cloud State and school district officials.

The Muslim faith, which is the dominant faith of Somali immigrants, forbids the touching of dogs. Things didn't go as well at Tech, Hurd said. Students there taunted his dog, and he finally felt he had to leave after he was told a student made a threat. Hurd met with Lockhart but said he did not feel comfortable continuing. Julia Espe, director of curriculum, instruction and assessment for St. Cloud school district, said the school needed to do a better job communicating.

Steffens said it is important to respect different cultures and the rights of disabled students. “I think this is part of the growth process when we become more diverse," Steffens said.

Yeah, communicating my ass, diversity and different cultures, balls! Diversity today means bend over and appease any bloody intolerant savage that wants to start something, the only cultures that get this "growth process" [*spit*] is the religion of 7th century savagery. What these spineless twits should have done, instead of waffling about tolerance and kumbaya, is taken that ungrateful cur [the Islamic savage] out of the class, put him on a plane back to Somalia and left him there to sprawl his arrogant, intolerant ass amongst the vast splendor and obviously superior culture created by his fellow savages. That's what should have have happened and would have set a fine example for the rest of the upstart savages before they get any ideas, instead, well you know what happened.

Hat tip Hang Right Politics.

Copy of email sent to the President of St. Cloud University by Radarsite:


president@stcloudstate.edu

Dear sir -- my name is Roger W. Gardner. I am the owner and editor of a political website Radarsite.com. I have had my articles published by Reuters, Chicago Sun Times, and CNN.com. I have regular readers form over 70 colleges and universites, and over 60 government agencies, including the State Department, DOD, House of Representatives, etc.

I have just read an article (enclosed) about these most recent alleged threats of violence against one of your students or his companion dog by a Somali Muslim student, and I am appalled. I think I am more outraged by your insipid and dismissive reaction to this affront than by the threat itself.

Aren't you supposed to be protecting your students? Isn't making a threat like this grounds for immediate expulsion and police intervention?

When your political leanings stand in the way of protecting your students, it is time for you to seek other employment.
This is a disgrace to American education.

I intend to write an article today voicing my outrage at your inept handling of this situation. I intend to disseminate it as widely as I can and cross post it to as many websites as possible.

If you do an about face and come to this poor students aid, I will happily report that change. However, until that time I will do whatever I can to bring this disgraceful episode to the public's attention.

Sincerely,
Roger W. Gardner
http://radarsite.blogspot.com/.


Response from President Potter
Dear Mr. Gardner:

I am writing in the hope that I can save you from embarrassing yourself. You have not read the article to which you refer carefully or correctly. The situation to which you refer occurred in a school operated by the St. Cloud School system. The university had no control over how the school system managed this issue. We have been in conversation with the school system’s leaders and we do understand the complexities with which they have to deal. We will work with District 742 to help make sure that this problem does not reoccur.

For our part we have worked with our student to adjust our expectations to his wishes so that he can continue his program at SCSU. For our student this is a question of his safety. He is still enrolled at SCSU and plans to finish here.

We value all of the new Americans who are coming to St. Cloud and are committed to working through the complicated intercultural issues that their arrival raises. We encourage SCSU students to study the issues, think about them carefully and respond with understanding. I would commend each of these objectives to you.

Personally, I would like to add that your message was addressed to a military veteran with 24 years of service to this country. The service to which I gave a good part of my life guaranteed the freedom of all Americans but I cannot condone ill-informed or hurtful language that purports to reinforce American values. Please consider that your hasty response was ill-considered.

Sincerely,

Earl H. Potter, III
President
St. Cloud State University
720 Fourth Avenue South
St. Cloud, MN 56301
(320) 308-2122
(320) 308-5139 fax


Radarsite email response to Presidant Potter:

Dr. Mr. Potter --

Thank you for your prompt reply to my email, and thank you for expressing your concern about the prospects of my embarrassing myself. Although I was not the original author of this piece I did post it to Radarsite, and I take full responsibity for that.

From the indignant tone of your reply I can only assume that this story is totally without merit, and that the facts of this case are completely different from what we have been led to believe. Or, as you -- rather condescendingly -- pointed out, that we may have misread the information and totally misunderstood the entire affair. Although you aptly expressed your anger and frustration over this apparent flawed report, you have not seen fit to refute any of the specific allegations. I suppose that we are just expected to take your word for it that we got it all wrong.

Well, Mr. Potter, maybe we did. If that is the case, if you can unequivocally state that none of these reported threats ever took place, that Mr. Hurd did not feel that either himself or his service dog was ever in any serious peril, if indeed the student who allegedly threatened him was not a Somali, and not a Muslim, and your administrators did not actually say what they were quoted as saying -- in short, if none of this actually happened, then I will quickly issue a retraction.

However, you have so far not refuted a single fact of this disturbing story. And what little clarification you offer us “We value all of the new Americans who are coming to St. Cloud and are committed to working through the complicated intercultural issues that their arrival raises.” only serves to demonstrate your apparent concern for the Somali student and his ‘complicated intercultural issues’; but little or no concern about his criminal threats, or Mr. Hurd’s victimization. To me, this hardly makes the case that you are protecting your students from Muslim intimidations, but rather, not too surprisingly, that you are more concerned with promoting your school’s multicultural agenda.

As far as your 24 years of service to this country is concerned, I congratulate you on being a veteran. I, too, am a veteran, and my son is a veteran, and ¾ of my readers are veterans; but, I’m sorry to say, that this has little or nothing to do with the subject at hand. The subject at hand is whether or not Mr. Hurd and/or his service dog was threatened by a Somali Muslim student, on the basis of his Islamic teachings, and whether or not this affair was handled appropriately.

As I stated above, if these basic facts of the story are proven to be incorrect then I will make the necessary retraction. Till then, I stand by my posting.

Yours,
Roger W. Gardner
Radarsite

Copy of comment left by Radarsite on updated version of the original article at the St. Cloud Times:

I just published a cross posting of this original article on Radarsite.com as it appeared in this newspaper. I also emailed my concerns to the president of St. Cloud University. He responded with an indignant denial. According to him, none of this ever happened, or we have completely misunderstood the entire affair. Somehow I tend to doubt this. I responded to his reply just now.

This whole exchange is reposted to that article on Radarsite.http://radarsite.blogspot.com/2008/05/from-other-sites-on-line-14-may-08.html

Does the SC Times stand by its original piece? If so, please let me know.

Thank you,
Roger W. Gardner
owner and editor of Radarsite

5/14/2008 8:26:33 PM

http://www.sctimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080514/NEWS01/105140050#pluckcomments

Response from Mr. Potter:

Dear Mr. Gardner,

Thank you for taking the time to share your thinking with me. I will try to lay out the facts that are not clearly represented in your communications, i.e., your website or your exchanges with me.

1. Tyler Hurd is a student in good standing at SCSU.
2. Somali students at Tech High School objected to the presence of his service dog at the High School.
3. The officials in the school district were taken by surprise as the situation evolved.
4. Muslim leaders around the world are working to adjust the teaching of strict Islamic understanding to the modern world. In St. Cloud, local leaders are working to help Somali students in our school system to learn a new reality.
5. Neither the school district nor the university anticipated this situation. Both of us made a mistake.
6. SCSU supported our student by adjusting our expectations to take into account a situation that made it impossible for him to complete his assignment in this term. We respected his concerns about his own safety. We adapted to the situation to enable him to continue his progress. We are working with the school district to prevent a reoccurrence.
7. My reference to my own service is relevant in that we/I have been accused of being “un-American”. This could not be further from the truth.
8. You refer to “your administrators”. You miss the point that student teachers from the university( SCSU) perform their student teaching in local schools systems that are not part of the university’s administrative structure. We have to work through partnership agreements as any cooperating but not unitary entities must do.
9. In short, the “Somali student” is not our student but a student at one of the local high schools. Moreover, we have only second hand reports of what might have been said and no direct evidence. Furthermore, we have no right to investigate a matter that occurred at the high school. SCSU is a public university that operates under a completely different legal and administrative structure.
10. We have taken care of our student, looked after his rights and guaranteed his educational progress.
11. We are committed to working with the school system to learn from this incident and move forward to a healthier world.

I reiterate my position that you have gotten this wrong and suggest that you correct the record. Having said this, I respect your courage and appreciate the time that you took to reply.

Sincerely,

Earl H. Potter, III
President
St. Cloud State University
720 Fourth Avenue South
St. Cloud, MN 56301
(320) 308-2122
(320) 308-5139 fax
www.stcloudstate.edu/president

Following Ms. Johnson's suggestion here is the complete article from the St. Cloud Times:

SCSU student leaves training at Technical High School
By Dave Aeikens • daeikens@stcloudtimes.com • May 12, 2008

A St. Cloud State University student in a teacher-training program at Technical High School left the school in late April because he says he feared for the safety of his service dog.

The school district calls it a misunderstanding, and officials there say they hoped Tyler Hurd, a 23-year-old junior from Mahtomedi who aspires to teach special education, would continue his training in the district.

Hurd said a student threatened to kill his service dog named Emmitt. The black lab is trained to protect Hurd when he has seizures.

The seizures, which can occur weekly, are from a childhood injury.
The dog has a pouch on his side that assists those who stop to help Hurd.

Hurd said he was unable to finish his 50 hours of field training at Tech. The university waived the remaining 10 hours, he said. He plans to do his student teaching outside a high school setting.

“We came up with a solution because I felt threatened by it," Hurd said.
The school district and university are working to make sure a similar situation doesn't happen.

Kate Steffens, dean of the college of education at St. Cloud State, and Tech assistant principal Lori Lockhart met Thursday.

The threat came from a Somali student who is Muslim, according to Hurd, St. Cloud State and school district officials.

The Muslim faith, which is the dominant faith of Somali immigrants, forbids the touching of dogs.
Hurd trained at Talahi Community School and Tech. He said his experience at Talahi was good. The Somali students there warmed to the dog and eventually petted him using paper to keep their hands off his fur, Hurd said.

Things didn't go as well at Tech, Hurd said. Students there taunted his dog, and he finally felt he had to leave after he was told a student made a threat. Hurd met with Lockhart but said he did not feel comfortable continuing.

Julia Espe, director of curriculum, instruction and assessment for St. Cloud school district, said the school needed to do a better job communicating.

“I think it was a misunderstanding where we didn't really prepare either side for possible implications," Espe said.

Espe said the school's investigation determined the student did not make a direct threat.

“We certainly welcome (Hurd) in our district, and we hope we can get this all resolved so he feels welcome and his dog is welcome," Espe said.

St. Cloud State places about 1,000 students in 240 schools to help prepare them for careers in education.

In St. Cloud school district, 330 are in the field training program Hurd was in and 94 are in student teaching.

Steffens said it is important to respect different cultures and the rights of disabled students.

“I think this is part of the growth process when we become more diverse," Steffens said.

Steffens called Hurd a good student and committed young man.

Gary Loch, who is the diversity coordinator for the district, said the situation was an unfortunate case of miscommunication.

“I'm not quite sure where the breakdown comes into play here," Loch said.



Radarsite's response to Mr. Potter:

Dear Mr. Potter --
Thank you for your reply. I have re-read the original article in the St. Cloud Times and carefully re-read your itemized response. Your latest response was polite and gentlemanly, and I will try to maintain this tone.

Here is your last paragraph:

I reiterate my position that you have gotten this wrong and suggest that you correct the record. Having said this, I respect your courage and appreciate the time that you took to reply.

You suggest that I correct the record. Alright, I'll try. To my mind, far from refuting them, your last letter only serves to substantiate the factual elements of the Times original story. I'm afraid that underneath that apparent civility your letter, to me, represents a rather typical bureaucratic response to a problem: rather than addressing the possible criminal act of the Somali student involved, and the subject of his subsequent punishment, you (and Ms. Johnson in her email) dispute the issues of administrative responsiblity and jurisdiction. You admit that both the school district and the university made mistakes. In my view, you're still making them. Your item number four, re: Muslim leaders around the world working to improve the precepts of Islam is, at best, highly controversial. However, that is a subject for another discussion.

I originally wrote to you, Mr. Potter, because Tyler Hurd is a student at your university, I therefore assumed that you had some responsibility in this affair.
I am afraid that I don't see this the same way that you do; I do not see this as some isolated incident, involving miscommunication; rather, I see this as a major cultural issue facing all of academia.

I would point out that I am evidently not alone in this opinion. While reposting the original article from the St. Cloud Times I re-read the many comments to it. If you haven't already I would suggest that you read them too.

Finally, as complimentary as it is, I find your last line a little baffling. I'm not quite sure where my purported "courage" plays into all this -- unless you mean that it takes courage to disagree with you. As for the time involved; that's not a problem. This is what I do.

I have made myself as clear as I possibly can. I have, at Ms. Johnson's request, reposted the entire original article and responded to your every objection. I hope that this puts an end to it.

Like it or not, this article, and this whole affair, stirred up a major bee's nest. I have had over 1,500 responses to this story so far, and it's still going strong. Perhaps, just perhaps, we here aren't the ones who have misunderstood this whole affair. This subject seems to be important to many people, perhaps more important than you first realized.

I may or may not continue replying to Ms. Johnson's emails, but I will, however, post any further replies from you.
Sincerely,

Roger W. Gardner
Radarsite




Some more interesting readers. Sorry, St. Cloud, but this just isn't going away. - rg



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