Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, April 4, 1993 TAG: 9304040232
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: D-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MICHAEL STOWE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
HOLIDAY NAME ISSUE RESURFACES
The Montgomery County School Board will decide Tuesday if religious names for holidays should be returned to the school calendar.Tuesday is also the second day - and traditionally one of great importance - of the Jewish Passover celebration.
Scheduling such a highly publicized meeting on a Jewish holiday is a perfect example of how Montgomery County citizens can be insensitive to its non-Christian community, said Larry Shumsky.
"The irony of holding this meeting on Tuesday," considering the controversy that this subject has generated, "I find simply extraordinary," he said.
Shumsky was one of eight speakers who participated in a panel discussion Saturday about cultural diversity in Montgomery County. The panel discussion was part of a daylong forum on tradition and diversity that was sponsored by the Virginia Tech YMCA.
Barbara Michelson, director of the YMCA, said the forum was prompted by the controversy over whether Christmas and Easter should be included on school calendars.
School Board Chairman Daniel Schneck, who is Jewish, resigned in December after the Board of Supervisors passed a resolution in support of the religious designations for the use of school holidays.
For three months the issue has pitted conservative Christian groups that favor the use of religious names against groups that say those terms are insensitive to the diverse, non-Christian population of the county. They favor the use of "winter break" and "spring break."
Shumsky said there is a clear lack of awareness of Jewish life and Jewish customs in mostly Christian Montgomery County.
"The ethnic and religious stereotypes are highly offensive," he said. "There is no malice intended, just a total lack of sensitivity."
One example, he said, is the saying, "I really Jewed him down."
"The problem is that even if you tell them how offensive it is, they just don't get it." he said.
Shumsky, an associate professor of history at Virginia Tech, said he was upset with the way Tech's administration reacted last December when a display of Hanukkah decorations in one of Tech's dining halls was destroyed by vandals.
"That whole situation was hushed up and smoothed over" by the administration, he said. Had it happened anywhere else it would have been in every newspaper.
About 70 people turned out for Saturday's forum to talk about the cultural diversity in Montgomery County. The consensus of the group was that education is the only way to overcome religious and cultural stereotypes.
"It's exciting to be diverse," said Adla Tamimi, a representative of the Council of International Students at Virginia Tech. "Only through education can this be achieved."
Tamimi said that her group, like Montgomery County, is looking into the way holidays are named on Tech's calendar.
"It has come to our attention that only certain holidays are on the calendar," she said. "A lot of holidays come and go that people aren't even aware of."
Tamimi said the Council of International students wants to add holidays, not remove the ones already on the calendar.
Jack LeDoux, chairman of the Montgomery County Christian Coalition and one of the main supporters of using religious names for holidays, said Christians have been wrongly portrayed as wanting to force their beliefs on everyone.
"Christians are not bigoted," he said. "We only offer an invitation, not an order."
If the School Board follows the recommendation of Superintendent Harold Dodge, "spring break" and "winter break" will remain on the school calendar.
The superintendent also is recommending that the school system send home with each pupil a separate listing of the major religious and civil holidays in the United States as compiled by the Educational Research Service.
The school system has used the term "winter break" for five years and "spring break" for 10 years. But news stories about a similar holiday-naming controversy in Frederick County drew the attention of several conservative church groups and other citizens to the issue in Montgomery County.