Connecticut School Board Addresses Celebration of Religious Holidays

December 14, 2001

Source: The Hartford Courant

On December 14, 2001, The Hartford Courant reported that at a recent school board meeting in Coventry, CT, "parents were upset about the wording of a memo School Superintendent Michael Malinowski sent to principals. The memo urged them to be mindful of the separation of church and state. Malinowski sent the memo after discovering that a creche and a cross had been put up in the school system... In impassioned speeches, parents said that in striving to be politically correct, the school system is being intolerant by not exposing students to religious holidays and faiths... Board of Education member Tracy Enders was irritated by comments about educating students about other religious holidays besides Christmas. She pointed out that celebrating Hanukkah as equivalent to Christmas trivializes Judaism because Hanukkah is actually a minor holiday in the Jewish faith... 'Don't trivialize other religions in order to celebrate the Christian holiday,' she said."