http://www.denverpost.com/ci_5828711

Bible finding spot among school texts
Because classes in Colorado take a scholarly look, there has been no public outcry like elsewhere, teachers say.
By Electa Draper
Denver Post Staff Writer
Article Last Updated: 05/06/2007 12:02:06 AM MDT


Chris Hartman holds his Bible while teaching at Wasson High School in Colorado Springs. (Post / Cyrus McCrimmon)Colorado Springs - When a self-professed pagan priestess and a devout Christian emerge from the same high school Bible literature class equally challenged but all smiles, teacher Chris Hartman knows he's doing his job.

"Is it my job to teach you your faith?" Hartman shouts.

"No!" the class shouts back.

"Whose job is it?"

"Ours!"

In this popular Wasson High School elective, for which there is a waiting list, students from different backgrounds and religions say they can think deep thoughts about the Bible and even share them.

And no one on the right or left has complained about the class, Hartman says. In contrast, other school districts across the country that have added Bible-based courses, or tried to, have attracted scrutiny and controversy.

When an Odessa, Texas, high school added a Bible- based course last year, national news reports depicted it as a pioneer in bringing the Bible back into public schools.

But the Bible has long been taught as the foundation of Western civilization in public schools in conservative-tagged Colorado Springs - and in liberal-labeled Boulder.

Making students think

Teachers in both places say they haven't heard the concerns, raised elsewhere, that such courses threaten the separation of church and state and lead to preaching, not teaching.

"We're talking Boulder here. If it were going to be controversial anywhere, you'd think it would be here," says Boulder Valley schools Deputy Superintendent Chris King. "But we have a highly educated population that gets it. An educated American must know the historical and cultural importance of the Bible. It's the cornerstone of much of our liberal arts education."

Jim Vacca, who teaches a Bible-based course at Boulder High School, says he thinks all literature is open to interpretation. "We need to trust our kids to be critical thinkers," he says.

Student Maxx Myers says Vacca's class is one of the few he's taken where more than one interpretation of the text is encouraged.

At Wasson, senior Emily Sawyer, who has Jesus' initials tattooed near her ankle, says she has had the Bible "pounded" into her since childhood and was afraid Hartman's course would threaten her Christian beliefs. It didn't, she says. But it made her think about why she believes what she does.

Classmate Rachel Speights, a pagan, says the course, in which she enrolled so she could argue more effectively with Christians, has made her more open-minded about all religion.

"It's OK to be Christian in here; it's just not required," says Jana Heinemann, who identifies herself as the resident Lutheran.

Bible-class offerings up

Many school districts have avoided activities that involve religion following a 1963 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that it is unconstitutional to require Bible devotionals and prayers in public schools. The decision also says that such study is constitutional when "taught objectively as part of a secular program," although only 8 percent of public schools offer Bible courses, according to the Center for Bible Literacy.

However, the North Carolina-based National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools, a curriculum publisher, says there is a new trend: The number of states with schools offering Bible-based courses has increased from 29 to 37 in the past six years.

At Palmer High School in Colorado Springs, the Bible literature course is based on the idea that the book is "a collection of writings produced by real people who lived in actual historic times," according to class guidelines.

"It's a literature class pure and simple, with clearly defined guidelines and parent sign-off," says teacher Todd Hegert.

Teacher Steve Kern says there were qualms when he developed Palmer's Bible curriculum in the late 1990s.

"We thought we were potentially stepping into a minefield. But we've had no problems," Kern says. "We tell students that the way the Bible is going to be approached is Monday- through-Friday school, not Sunday school."

In Hartman's class at Wasson on Friday, the students discuss Genesis, which describes who created the world and humanity and how. The gap in the story, Hartman says, is why. It doesn't say why.

Students suggest possible interpretations: God was lonely. God was bored. God wanted to experiment. God wished to express love. There are an infinite number of inferences, Hartman says. The inferences the students choose will define God for them.

"It's not my goal to spread the Judeo-Christian perspective," Hartman says. "It is my goal to teach them to think critically for themselves. It's up to them to decide what they want to believe in."

Other school districts are struggling with whether a Bible- based class can work for them.

Moffat County schools Superintendent Peter Bergmann says he was surprised to hear that other public schools in Colorado taught the Bible. In March more than 800 Craig residents petitioned to add an elective Bible class at Moffat County High School.

As a result, Bergmann says, the district is undergoing a lengthy curriculum review and is not ready to add a Bible- based class this fall.

Such concerns seem distant in Hartman's class, where students say they've learned to respect one another's different views of the Bible.

"At the end of the day," says student Warrior Jennings, "we're still smiling and we're still friends."

Staff writer Electa Draper can be reached at 970-385-0917 or edraper@denverpost.com.