FightBackBetter Editor Response to Scotch Plains / Fanwood Board President
The President of the Scotch Plains / Fanwood School Board was kind enough to acknowledge this editor’s correspondence. The following is published now at 3:30 pm before this evening’s meeting with the hope that the board president will see this before the meeting. Best to all on a resolution of this issue that respects the civil rights and protected free speech rights of staff from board or administration overstep.
Dear President Evan Murray,
Thank you for your kind acknowledgement. Nobody is trying to force anyone to agree with our view but likewise it is not your job or the administration, other teachers, parents, disagreeable community members to force every staff member to conform to your views either. (I do not assume to know your individual view and I am not asking.)
Fact is most of the rest of the people of the world have been watching the live streams of genocidal actions and reading reports that are not slanted toward favoritism to Israel as in the US. So most of the rest of the world sees things differently – and community schools teach diverse student bodies employing diverse staffs – in every way including world view, political understanding and whether Israel should be above accountability. You can not force loyalty to Israel. You can not make people who have been watching this live stream for the last year to unsee what they have seen – those who have read and studied the actual level of degradation.
And what message for your Palestinian, Lebanese, Arab, Muslim, and rest of the world including American, students that don’t like genocide when they see one of their teachers punished for saying Palestinian people have dignity and deserve peace.
I am not asking you to agree but you need to recognize the civil and constitutional rights of your teachers and your students, and the families of students and of other community members that you disagree with.
On your own time have at it. State your opinion but when you sit behind the board gavel you need to be the adult in the room, the voice of reason – the one that says – let’s not divide the community over legally held opinions and views and lets get back to education. We need to accept that our community has a diversity of views on this as well as our staff. Any teacher, administrator – or board member for that matter is entitled to their own opinion and to state and act on that opinion on their own time. Do not use school resources, use the school as a platform or captive audience for political pandering – on either side. If there is any of that involved in this case it should be dealt with – short of that – it is not our jurisdiction.
Those are the words!
Good luck with the meeting – it is a tough one. You are not there to solve the world’s problems but you do have a job to protect the civil rights of your staff and that includes their right to their own world views. You can not control the minds of staff and control their actions outside the district.
Thanks again for acknowledgment.
Bob WItanek
—–Original Message—–
From: Evan Murray <emurray@spfk12.org>
Sent: Jan 23, 2025 2:10 PM
To: Bob Witanek <bwitanek@igc.org>
Subject: Re: [EXTERNAL] Scotch Plains / Fanwood Scool Admin: Respect Civil Right and Free Speech of Staff
Thank you for your email. Your feedback has been sent to the appropriate administrator.
Regards.
Evan Murray
President, Scotch Plains-Fanwood Board of Education
