Virginia Schools

Honor codes have always been serious matters in tradition-laden old Virginia schools such as VMI--an institution that produced Gen. George C. Marshall, whose faculty once included legendary Confederate Gen. Thomas Jonathan (Stonewall) Jackson, and whose teen cadets charged Yankee bayonets at the Civil War battle of New Market. At Washington and Lee University, students are guided by an honor system installed by Robert E. Lee 129 years ago.

Jean Harris, the onetime headmistress of an elite girls' school whose trial in the fatal 1980 shooting of the celebrity diet doctor who jilted her generated front-page headlines and national debates about whether she was a feminist martyr or vengeful murderer, has died. She was 89. Harris, who spent nearly 12 years in prison for the shooting death of her longtime boyfriend, "Scarsdale Diet" doctor Herman "Hy" Tarnower, died Sunday at an assisted-living facility in New Haven, Conn., of complications related to old age, her son James said.

A 14-year-old student opened fire with a pistol in the hallway of a high school Monday as students took final exams, wounding a basketball coach and a volunteer aide, police said. The injuries were not life-threatening, doctors said. Several students were in the hallway at the time of the shooting, and investigators believe one of them, not the coach or the aide, was the intended target, police said.

A framed copy of the Ten Commandments that had been on display at a Virginia public high school will be replaced by a page from a history textbook depicting the commandment tablets and highlighting their role in the "roots of democracy. " The swap is being made under a proposed settlement of a lawsuit that contended displaying the text of the commandments violated the Constitutional requirement for separation of church and state. The American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, which sued the Giles County school board, and Liberty Counsel, which represented the school board, applauded the proposed settlement.

As California and other states press for better performance from public schools, they may soon discover a lesson that Virginia learned this year the hard way: If you raise academic expectations, prepare at first for failure. Virginia, like California, has adopted detailed new benchmarks for what students should know from grade to grade in English, mathematics, history and science. Here they call them "Standards of Learning."

A federal judge ruled that Virginia's system of appointive school boards, the only one of its kind in the nation, is constitutional despite arguments that it discriminates against blacks. The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit challenging the process on behalf of seven black citizens earlier this year, alleging that blacks' ability to win school board appointments was limited in the vast majority of cases.

A 5-year-old girl banned from school because she has AIDS will be allowed to return to kindergarten in Fairfax County, Va. Still pending was a suit by the child's mother seeking a court order requiring readmission, although the school board voted 8 to 0 in favor of letting the child back. The child, who has not been identified, is undergoing treatment with the drug AZT. She is believed to have contracted the virus from a blood transfusion shortly after birth.

Virginia's House of Delegates approved a bill Friday that would allow public schools to post the Ten Commandments. The measure, which now goes to the Senate, would require the state Board of Education to write guidelines for displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms, along with the text from three secular documents: the 1st Amendment, the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Constitution. It would be up to local school officials whether to display the texts.

Gov. L. Douglas Wilder said he plans to cut $333 million in local aid to help balance the state budget, and those reductions will hurt school budgets. Speaking to state Senate committees in Richmond, Va., Wilder detailed his plans to deal with a projected $1.4-billion deficit in the state's $26-billion 1990-92 biennial budget. Wilder's budget director, Karen Washabau, said other cuts the governor has proposed in state agency spending could cause 400 to 1,500 layoffs.

The homework assignment scribbled on the blackboard in the seventh-grade social studies class read: "Draw what you think a typical immigrant in the year 2000 looks like." One handout was a crossword puzzle with questions like "What's happening to Asian and Latin American countries today that causes many immigrants to come to the U.S.?" All 240 seventh-graders at Gunston Middle School in suburban Arlington, Va.

President Obama, "heartbroken" by the unfolding tragedy in Japan, reiterated Monday that the United States stood ready to support its ally in the aftermath of Friday’s devastating earthquake and tsunami. "The United States will continue to offer any assistance we can as Japan continues to recover from multiple disasters," Obama said. His remarks came at a Virginia middle school, the latest event in what the White House has called "Education Month. " The president used Monday’s event to call on Congress to reauthorize "No Child Left Behind" before the start of the next school year.

A former Virginia high school valedictorian held in a Saudi Arabian prison for 20 months was accused in federal court Tuesday of conspiring with Al Qaeda to assassinate President Bush. Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, 23, an American citizen, and at least 10 unidentified co-conspirators allegedly planned in 2002 and 2003 to kill Bush either by shooting him or by detonating a car bomb, according to an indictment released at a hearing before a U.S. magistrate judge in Alexandria, Va.

Virginia Atty. Gen. Jerry W. Kilgore plans to appeal to the Supreme Court a case involving the Virginia Military Institute's dinnertime prayers after an evenly divided appellate court upheld its previous decision declaring the prayers unconstitutional. "These prayers are part of VMI's educational program and are precisely the kind of prayers recited in the United States military, on ships at sea each night, and before lunch" at the U.S. Naval Academy, Kilgore said.

Some southern West Virginia schools won't be able to reopen this year because of damage from last week's deadly floods, officials said Monday. Floods and mudslides caused by torrential rainfall were blamed for at least six deaths in West Virginia and two in Virginia. Six people were still missing Monday in West Virginia, and one man was unaccounted for in Kentucky. Damages continued to mount Monday as residents braced for more rain this week.

Virginia's House of Delegates approved a bill Friday that would allow public schools to post the Ten Commandments. The measure, which now goes to the Senate, would require the state Board of Education to write guidelines for displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms, along with the text from three secular documents: the 1st Amendment, the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Constitution. It would be up to local school officials whether to display the texts.

The homework assignment scribbled on the blackboard in the seventh-grade social studies class read: "Draw what you think a typical immigrant in the year 2000 looks like." One handout was a crossword puzzle with questions like "What's happening to Asian and Latin American countries today that causes many immigrants to come to the U.S.?" All 240 seventh-graders at Gunston Middle School in suburban Arlington, Va.

As California and other states press for better performance from public schools, they may soon discover a lesson that Virginia learned this year the hard way: If you raise academic expectations, prepare at first for failure. Virginia, like California, has adopted detailed new benchmarks for what students should know from grade to grade in English, mathematics, history and science. Here they call them "Standards of Learning."

A 14-year-old student opened fire with a pistol in the hallway of a high school Monday as students took final exams, wounding a basketball coach and a volunteer aide, police said. The injuries were not life-threatening, doctors said. Several students were in the hallway at the time of the shooting, and investigators believe one of them, not the coach or the aide, was the intended target, police said.