Amazing Grace....Denied

This is a true story about a friend of a friend. This is written by Christi about her 5th grade son Mark.


I'm pissed, I'm frustrated, I'm confused, I'm angered, I'm honestly at a loss for words, which for those who know me, know that doesn't happen often, if ever.

Long story short: Mark was given the opportunity to work on an extra credit project for Science. His grades have suffered lately, so we jumped at the opportunity to score some points. The lesson had been on wood and it's various uses, and his teacher knowing of his guitar playing challenged him to put together a presentation & report on the woods used in guitars, and then showing how they are used. Perfect! No problem.

Mark gathers the necessary info, writes his report & then decides that instead of taking his guitar into school to show & play, he'll make a video of him explaining the various parts & play a short song on it. I like this idea much MUCH better as I was terrified of him taking the Taylor to school. He puts a great presentation on video and gets his grandmother to accompany his playing on piano. They do 2 takes, are pleased with the results, project is finished!

Mark turns it into his teacher Friday, and is supposed to make his presentation on Monday. He comes home yesterday devastated as the teacher will not allow him to show the video part of his project to the class. Mind you, this is probably 75% of the project is on that tape. He breaks down the various components of the guitar, their purpose, their construction etc.. in addition to playing a song, but the song is merely a small part of the video. But he is not allowed to use the video in school... why you ask? Cause the song he chose to play was AMAZING GRACE.

I've yet to come up with the proper words to express my frustration, disappointment & anger over this. We don't yet know the fate of the project now, but i can only imagine he won't get the credit for it after-all, even though he put together a kick-butt presentation (and did it on his own, we merely recorded it!) . But I'm just flabbergasted. Mark is crushed, as he just can't grasp the separation of Church & State and just keeps asking "Why do they want to take God out of School, out of the Pledge, out of everything?".. And I say to that? "I don't know son.. I just don't know"...