All over the United States, in schools, churches, government offices, courtrooms the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, were being remembered by observing a moment of silence.
The Ravena-Coeymans-Selkirk Board of Education Disses 911 Remembrance
It’s all over the place in the RCS school district: The schools of the RCS Central School District refused to remember the victims of the 911 terror attacks with a moment of silence. Even the students are outraged as we receive reports of Facebook posts posted by RCS students and expressing their outrage that there was no moment of silence on Monday, September 11, 2017. We find this disgraceful but are very impressed that kids who weren’t even born yet or were infants at the time of the attacks express such compassion and sensitivity to be outraged by their adult handlers’ lack of compassion and sensitivity to a national tragedy that resulted in multiple wars that are still causing misery and suffering at home and abroad.
What’s next?
Will RCS start flying the Saudi flag?
What’s next parents, residents, taxpayers? Do we start pledging allegiance to the flag of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia? Will we next see the Saudi flag raised at the high school?
Most of us will remember 911 with a certain disbelief even today, years after the attack. We all know that the terrorists who planned and executed the attacks were from Saudi Arabia, a country with a long record of anti-West sentiments and whose human rights crimes are legendary. That’s Osama bin Laden’s home country and his family are affluent citizens of Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia where Sharia or Islamic law requires women to be completely covered and still features public beheadings as their preferred capital punishment.
SABIC’s Flag Flies in Selkirk!
Right in our midst we have SABIC is a global leader in diversified chemicals and whose headquarters are in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Arabian government owns 70 percent of SABIC shares, with the remainder held by private investors in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Cooperation Council countries.Check out their website and tell us it’s not scary! SABIC is located in Selkiirk/Feura Bush and has recently been granted substantial school tax incentives locally. The plot thickens!
According to a 2014 Times Union report by Brian Nearing, “Selkirk plastics plant hit with third environmental fine in three years,” the Saudi company was fined $16,000 for those violations but in 2011 and 2013 paid $241,000.00 in fines for environmental violations. But then that’s mere pocket change to the Saudis. More improtantly, apparently the Saudis are not happy just killing Americans and destroying American property, they aim to destroy American environment, too, starting right in our own backyards. The plot thickens even more!
So why are we so concerned about a Saudi chemicals company in Selkirk who, like so many American companies, is intent on destroying our environment and our health? After all, it’s just a country several thousands of miles away with terrorist ties and human rights violations. Not much unlike so many of America’s “friends”. So what you might be thinking.
So what? Here’s why:
The property owners in the RCS Central School District pay millions in taxes to support the now more than $46 million school budget for the district, while local towns are giving companies like Sabic and Selkirk Cogen tax breaks. The residents of the RCS Central School District vote for the members of the RCS Central School District Board of Education. According to the RCS CD Board of Education website, the board is:
“A local board of education is an agency of New York State that is governed by state law and the regulations of the commissioner of education.”
The BoE website also states the five main responsibilities of the RCS BoE to be:
- to establish all school district policies;
- to develop an annual budget for public approval;
- to approve or disapprove the superintendent’s recommendations regarding personnel matters and the many contracts the district must enter;
- to review courses of study and textbooks;
- to act as a two-way communications link between residents and the superintendent
The site also states that: “The decisions of your elected board of education affect your child, your child’s future, your tax rate, and the well-being of your community.”
RCS BoE President James Latter is a SABIC Employee; Jason Hyslop, a BoE member is a SABIC Employee!!!
In 2013, we published two articles on this blog with very serious warnings: James Latter: Why He’s A Bad Choice and Latter-Hyslop-Brown: The VERY WRONG Choice! but somehow Latter and Hyslop got elected to the board, and it’s been downhill ever since. You see, both James Latter, RCS BoE president, and Jason Hyslop are employees of SABIC. Where do you think their loyalties lie? In their paychecks or in the interests of the school district?
So now you have two RCS Central School District Board of Education members, its president, James Latter, and a sitting board member, Jason Hyslop, both employees of Saudi-owned SABIC, “establishing school district polices” and to “review courses of study and textbooks“, and keep in mind that, according to the Board’s own statement, “the decisions of your elected board of education affect your child, your child’s future, your tax rate, and the well-being of your community.”
So now that we have informed you AGAIN that you have two SABIC lackies on your board of education and you put them there, we hope that at the next meeting you will propose that courses for conversational Arabic be offered the elementary, middle and high school curriculums, because you’re going to need it to pledge allegiance to the Saudi flag. After all, the RCS CD Board of Education does establish all school district policies and their decisions affect your children, your child’s future, and the well-being of your community.
So why do you think there was no moment of silence in RCS schools on September 11, 2017? Do we really have to answer that question?
Here you go, we’ll get you stared. Repeat after Mr Latter:
لَا إِلٰهَ إِلَّا الله مُحَمَّدٌ رَسُولُ الله
lā ʾilāha ʾillā-llāh, muhammadun rasūlu-llāh
“There is no god but God: Muhammad is the Messenger of God.”
Get the Saudi Companies off our Board of Education!!!
The Editor
Albany NY a.k.a. Smalbany 
Principal Editor
September 21, 2017 at 6:32 pm
I’m not sure we wrote anything about a “conspiracy,” unless it was implied in the BoE-Sabic verbage. That notwithstanding, we do feel that such programs should be ensured by the BoE as part of their curriculum oversight, and their duties to oversee the academic and civic health and welfare of the students in the RCS Central School District.
As far as we are concerned the puerile “excuse” of “I forgot” is not worth a second thought. For crissake! It was 9/11!!! It was all over everywhere even if you were brain dead you couldn’t overlook the fact that it was freaking 9/11. Was it a salaried teacher or administrator who “forgot?” If so, s/he owes the community and everyone affected by 9/11 an apology. The principal of the RCS high school owes everyone an apology for having such a dumbass on the payroll!
“I forgot” is something we expect from a third-grader when the homework wasn’t done. I “forgot” doesn’t cut it when you forget a test or an exam, or if you happen to forget that a paper is due. What’s the teacher’s response to that? What is our response to the dumbass adult who “forgot.”
9/11 should be an occasion for a school-wide assembly to present the event and the issues surrounding it and opening it up to dialogue and conversation. It’s an enormously valuable teaching and learning moment, even for those pupils who may not even have been born on 9/11. Isn’t that what education is all about?
Oh! Pardon me. I got lost in my diatribe and forgot we are discussing the RCS Central School district. The same school district that has no money for books but plenty of money for AstroTurf. The school district run by Saudi-lackies. They’re idiots and someone has to answer for their failings!
Thank you, Simon, for your comment. It’s much appreciated as usual.
The Editor
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Simon
September 21, 2017 at 2:48 pm
I don’t think this was a conspiracy. The story I heard was that the person at the high school who was in charge of this “forgot”. They did a make-good the following morning. (Awkward!) I heard that the elementary schools did each have their own observance on the proper morning. I don’t know about the middle school.
Infants on 9/11/2001 would currently be in 11th grade. But in many cases the observances can serve as a starting points for conversations for the students who weren’t even alive at the time of the attack.
S
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