Holding schools hostage to the Ark Park?

Posted 22 August 2015 by Matt Young

Simon Brown of Americans United reports that 2 Kentucky lawmakers plan to introduce a bill that would prohibit local public schools from beginning the fall term before late August. The avowed purpose of the legislation is to support the Ark Park. One of the legislators, Damon Thayer, explained,

Grant County is set to become a major tourist destination due to the presence of the Ark. But there won't be many families from Kentucky visiting in August if we continue with the current calendar

Mr. Brown points out in his article, however, that if the Ark Park will truly get 2 million visitors in its first year, the vast majority will not come from Grant County and thereabout. Local school officials are not so keen on the idea either. In addition, and not entirely off topic, Dan Phelps notifies us of another editorial (available in hardcopy only) by Mark Looy of Answers in Genesis. Mr. Phelps writes that Mr. Looy

will not admit that AIG's loss of the tax incentive is because of their discriminatory hiring practices. He ignores the advertisement for Computer Assisted Design technician from a year ago that got them in trouble. If you recall, the advertisement required adherence to AiG's statement of faith, salvation history, and membership in very specific types of Christian churches. Furthermore, when Ark Encounter originally received the tax incentive in 2010/2011 they specifically said they would not discriminate in hiring.

Ark Encounter is a for-profit corporation, and Mr. Looy knows perfectly well how to get his tax incentives restored; as I noted recently,

... Ark Encounter's tax incentives will be restored, if only they pledge in writing that they will not discriminate in employment. Ark Encounter has so far declined to give such assurance, which makes a body speculate that they just might be thinking of laundering all Ark Encounter employment through Answers in Genesis in order to circumvent the law.

13 Comments

DS · 22 August 2015

Seriously? You can't start school because that would prevent people from coming to the BIG LIE! Why don't they just cancel school altogether and require that everybody come to the BIG LIE instead. That would save the taxpayers money. What a bunch of morons.

Ted Herrlich · 22 August 2015

I think they should drop all this semi-covert support and just sponsor a law making a visit to little kennie's abortions mandatory for all Grant Co. schoolchildren. Wouldn't that be fun to watch?

eamonknight · 22 August 2015

Mucking with the school year to benefit a private for-profit business? (Never mind the religious angle) Is that even legal?

stevaroni · 22 August 2015

Seems to me that if making sure that little Johnnie sees the glory of Noah's Big Boat(tm) is so important to you that you're planning to drag the family a hundred or two miles across Kentucky and plunk down 30 bucks each for the privilege, then you're probably the type of family that can be reliably counted on to accomplish that on one of the other 75 or so days open to you during summer vacation.

harold · 22 August 2015

DS said: Seriously? You can't start school because that would prevent people from coming to the BIG LIE! Why don't they just cancel school altogether and require that everybody come to the BIG LIE instead. That would save the taxpayers money. What a bunch of morons.

I'll point out the obvious fact that they would if they could. It would be one of the first things they would do if they could.

stevaroni · 22 August 2015

DS said: Seriously? You can't start school because that would prevent people from coming to the BIG LIE! Why don't they just cancel school altogether and require that everybody come to the BIG LIE instead.

Already been done, to some extent. Any number of states look the other way when religiously motivated parents withdraw their children from real schools and then home school them using all manner of creationist drivel. Or not. I'd like to be wrong on this, but I know of no state which aggressively then checks up on these kids to learn if they are, in fact, learning anything at all or if the days "curriculum" consists of a morning of directed prayer followed by an hour of Sesame Street.

tomh · 22 August 2015

stevaroni said: I know of no state which aggressively then checks up on these kids to learn if they are, in fact, learning anything at all or if the days "curriculum" consists of a morning of directed prayer followed by an hour of Sesame Street.

States are all over the place with regard to homeschooling, probably no two are alike. Some do indeed control the the curriculum, require standardized testing, require teacher qualification, etc. Some do none of that. Some, (California, for instance), treat homeschooling like private schools, and so on. As this NYT article from this year shows, however, regulations are becoming ever more lax, as homeschooling increases. All part of the religiously inspired legal exemption lobby.

Matt Young · 22 August 2015

Iâll point out the obvious fact that they would if they could. It would be one of the first things they would do if they could.

Depends who you mean by "they," but it seems to me that they are doing it -- what after all are charter schools and vouchers (and to a lesser extent open enrollment) but end runs around the public school system?

Just Bob · 22 August 2015

stevaroni said: ...or if the days "curriculum" consists of a morning of directed prayer followed by an hour of Sesame Street.

Whoa! No way, dude! Sesame Street is of the Devil! I mean, it teaches kids that monsters (i.e., demons) are their friends. And some of them are colored red (communist!) and some are purple (gay!).

DavidK · 22 August 2015

And of course if the kiddies and family attend, they'll all be ponying up full price for their tickets to this fiasco.

DavidK · 22 August 2015

Off subject, but when republicans are in charge, all sorts of strange things can happen;

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/08/22/kentucky-gop-allows-sen-paul-to-run-for-re-election-president-at-same-time/

Cogito Sum · 23 August 2015

DavidK said: Off subject, but when republicans are in charge, all sorts of strange things can happen; http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/08/22/kentucky-gop-allows-sen-paul-to-run-for-re-election-president-at-same-time/

Imagine that, republican/theocratic over reach as governance (Kentucky State Senators Damon Thayer and Chris Girdler), how 'unusual'... remember Regent University School of Law and Monica Goodling? http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2007/04/08/scandal_puts_spotlight_on_christian_law_school/?page=full

alicejohn · 23 August 2015

Moving school calendars around for economic reasons is not unheard of. Virginia prohibits schools from opening before Labor Day without a waiver to allow people to go their large amusement parks North of Richmond and in the Williamsburg area. Plus it allows the many high school kids who work in the parks to work a few more days. The parks are open only on the weekends for a couple of months after Labor Day.

Certain factions in Maryland are trying to pass a similar restriction on their schools to encourage tourist spending in Ocean City. When I went to the University of Maryland in the early 80's, there was a big push to move their calendar to accommodate the many college students who had to commit to work through Labor Day as a condition of their employment in Ocean City.

So there is precedence for state governments playing around with school calendars for economic reasons. On the surface, I don't have a big problem with it. Certainly one of the purposes of state governments is to raise revenue. But I don't see the Big Creationist Museum Shaped Like a Big Boat...err the Ark Park drawing enough visitors to warrant messing with the school calendars.