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CNN Student News
Aired June 28, 2002 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: You're watching CNN STUDENT NEWS seen in schools around the world because learning never stops and neither does the news.
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SCHOOLCHILDREN: And to the republic, for which it stands, one nation under God.
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SHELLEY WALCOTT, CO-HOST: The debate over the Pledge of Allegiance tops our Friday show.
SUSAN FRIEDMAN, CO-HOST: The SAT is changing, true or false? We fill in the blank in "Focus."
WALCOTT: A question of identity is the topic of today's "Perspectives." And the wildfires round out our "Week in Review."
Welcome to Friday. This is CNN STUDENT NEWS. I'm Shelley Walcott.
FRIEDMAN: And I'm Susan Friedman.
The U.S. Supreme Court hands down a couple of rulings that could reshape the nation's schools. Coming up, I'll tell you about one decision which lowers the wall between church and state.
First though, Shelley has more on a federal court decision that raises it.
WALCOTT: The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday that the Pledge of Allegiance is unconstitutional when it's recited in schools because it uses the words "under God." The case originated in Northern California but is now spurring outrage and disbelief nationwide.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If they said it was unconstitutional, I feel that that's very contradictory because the Constitution and the First Amendment states that you have the freedom of speech and religion. Well I know that people can go back and forth and say I don't practice that religion therefore I shouldn't have to deal with it. But to me, "under God" is not necessarily going to shout Christian ethics and force-feed Christianity down somebody's throat. It's been a part of the Pledge of Allegiance and I think it should stay.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But it's not unconstitutional, because you read the Constitution, you know it says that the word creator is used. So is the next step to actually change the original Constitution? I mean that's my opinion. I think -- I think if you're going to live in this country you know there needs to be, you know, some sort of pledge that says you're going along with what our Constitution says.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I personally think it's a beautiful -- I -- beautiful thing to pledge allegiance to the flag. I feel very happy when I do it and I feel great emotionally to do it. And I think that it's -- just because it says under God. I think there's nothing wrong with saying, you know, under God.
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WALCOTT: For more on the nation's reaction to the controversial ruling, we go to CNN's Judy Woodruff.
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JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): In Canada for the G-8 summit, President Bush suggested the judges lacked common sense, and that despite the separation of church and state, God belongs in our civic life.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: America is a nation that -- is a nation that values a relationship with an almighty. The declaration of god in the Pledge of Allegiance doesn't violate rights. As a matter of fact, it's a confirmation of the fact that we received our rights from God, as proclaimed in our Declaration of Independence.
WOODRUFF: At the U.S. Capitol, members of the House and Senate stood today to speak the pledge, "under God" included. Across the country, most people said they thought the court decision went too far.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think they should be able to recite it, you know. If the child doesn't want to, so be it, let them sit down. But the other ones, sure.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's obvious to me that there is a god. And just by making it pretty much general -- saying god and not specifying on a belief -- I don't think that's a problem at all.
WOODRUFF: But there were some dissenting voices.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I agree with the court decision, actually. I think parents and students, as they get older, have the right to select whether or not they want to participate in saying the Pledge of Allegiance.
WOODRUFF: A soldier CNN interviewed in Afghanistan said she opposed the court decision.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I feel that this is a part of our history and no one has the right to change it.
WOODRUFF: But she also said she thought the whole debate was a little -- quote -- "silly," given the serious problems facing America. The man who successfully sued to keep his daughter from having to recite the pledge was undaunted by the widespread condemnation, especially from Washington.
MICHAEL NEWDOW, PLAINTIFF: They're politicians, and they know that 93 percent of the country believes in God. And if you want to get votes, you sometimes avoid the Constitution and you go for political power.
WOODRUFF: Judy Woodruff, CNN, Washington.
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WALCOTT: They're harder to find but some people do support the federal court's decision.
James Hattori reports from Elk Grove, California, home to the plaintiff in this case, who explained why he began his fight two years ago.
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MICHAEL NEWDOW, PLAINTIFF: I deny the existence of everything for which I have no belief.
JAMES HATTORI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Michael Newdow likes the smell of roses, but what he's savoring now is an unprecedented legal victory. A U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision against the Elk Grove, California school district, where his daughter attends classes, declaring the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional because the words "under God" were added by Congress in 1954.
NEWDOW: This is coercion when you take little kids and you put them in a setting where the teacher is leading the students, even if she doesn't have to say the words, she's still being coerced to, you know, countenance this religious belief system that she may not want to agree with.
HATTORI: Newdow, a 49-year-old emergency room physician who also holds a law degree, says he didn't file the lawsuit two years ago to seek publicity. He did it because he believes the government illegally endorses religion, whether it's words printed on currency or recited in a classroom.
NEWDOW: The first 10 words of the Bill of Rights says "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion" and that's what won this case. And that has permitted our country to thrive, our religions to thrive. All our churches are allowed to do whatever they want because we have this, because government doesn't get involved. And here government was getting involved.
HATTORI: For other parents in the suburban Sacramento neighborhood, it's not so clear cut.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: His daughter is not required to recite it. She can sit in her chair and do something else while the rest of us do it. That should be our privilege. That should be our freedom.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nobody can tell anybody else what they can and cannot believe in. In school, I don't see the harm.
NEWDOW: Individuals can invoke the name of God as much as they want. That's their free exercise right under the constitution. The government may not. And we just have to keep those two things separate.
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WALCOTT: For a background on the Pledge of Allegiance, head to our Web site, CNNSTUDENTNEWS.com.
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LINDA BEERMANN, LINCOLN, NEBRASKA: I'm Linda Beermann from Lincoln, Nebraska. And my question is: When and by whom was the Pledge of Allegiance written?
BRUCE MORTON, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Linda, a Christian Socialist minister named Francis Bellamy wrote the pledge back in 1892. His version appeared in "The Youth's Companion," a family magazine kind of like "Reader's Digest," and it was meant for students to recite on Columbus Day.
CHILDREN: I pledge allegiance to the flag...
MORTON: Bellamy wrote, "I pledge allegiance to my flag, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
As a Socialist, he wanted to add equality, but he knew not everyone believed in equal rights for women and minorities.
In 1923 at a national flag conference, they dropped "my flag" and instead, inserted "the flag of the United States." Congress officially recognized the pledge in 1942 during World War II. The Supreme Court ruled in 1943 that children could not be forced to recite it in school.
KEN RHOADES, BLAIR, NEBRASKA: My name is Ken Rhodes from Blair, Nebraska. And I was wondering when "under God" was added to the Pledge of Allegiance.
MORTON: Ken Rhoades, you asked when they added the phrase "under God." That was in 1954 during Dwight Eisenhower's presidency and at the height of the Cold War.
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FRIEDMAN: We continue our "Focus" on court decisions now with the issue of school drug testing. The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that if students want to participate in extracurricular activities then schools may initiate drug testing. The decision involves middle and high schools and stems from a case in Oklahoma. It includes after school activities, sports, band, chorus, cheer leading, you name it.
Another ruling involved the use of school vouchers. The high court said that vouchers are constitutional or legal to use. Vouchers can be used for payment at private or religious schools and offer an alternative to public schools.
To Cleveland, Ohio now where the whole case began. Here's Kathy Slobogin.
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KATHY SLOBOGIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is what the fuss is all about. Taxpayer dollars pay the tuition for more than half the students at this Catholic school.
SCHOOLCHILDREN: In the name of the father, and the son and in the holy spirit, amen.
SLOBOGIN: Ninety-nine percent of the voucher students in Cleveland go to religious schools. It wasn't intended to be that way, but very few nonreligious private schools participate in the program, or have tuitions the $2,500 state voucher can cover. Sister Karen, principal of St. Francis, says parents choose her school for its brand of education, not its brand of religion.
SISTER KAREN, PRINCIPAL, ST. FRANCIS SCHOOL: We have 20 children out of our 260 children who are Catholic. So we're not here to make more Catholics. That's not our purpose. We're here to educate children with a moral base.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Does anyone know what the first commandment is?
SLOBOGIN: That means half-hour religion class every day, tailored to the students' eclectic mix of faith, but nevertheless, religion. Parents here seem hungry for a moral dimension they feel they can't get in public schools.
VICTORIA POPE, VOUCHER PARENT: They encourage the things that I'm trying to teach them at home. It gets reinforced here.
SLOBOGIN: For Sister Karen, the fight over church and state misses the point.
SISTER KAREN: I think it's about children. I think it's about education. I think it's about parent choice.
SLOBOGIN: For Linda Hartwick, principal at a public school just over a mile away, it's about money.
LINDA HARTWICK, PRINCIPAL, FOREST HILL PARKWAY ACADEMY: Less students, less money.
SCHOOLCHILDREN (singing): My eyes are looking forward, I'm standing straight and tall, my hands are on my shoulder and I'm ready for the hall.
SLOBOGIN: Hartwick's school is a model school. But they scramble for every dollar. It doesn't help struggling inner-city schools, say educators here, to have state aid diverted to private schools -- private schools that, unlike public schools, can throw out any student who doesn't measure up.
HARTWICK: And when they are let go from the voucher schools, where do they come? They come to the public schools.
SLOBOGIN: Despite the odds, Cleveland public schools may be doing a better job than many voucher parents think.
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FRIEDMAN: There are also some changes coming to those with college in their future. Let me ask you a question, but breathe easy, it's multiple choice. Each year more than a million high school students a) wake up with butterflies in their stomach, b) grab a No. 2 pencil, c) take the SAT test or d) all of the above? The answer is D. But this crucial right of passage may be changing as Maria Hinojosa explains.
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MARIA HINOJOSA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The biggest change for the SATs will be that the number two pencil used mostly to fill in dots, will now be used by students to write an essay, the first time college admissions officers will have access to work written by students without help from anyone.
BILL FITZSIMMONS, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: It's real. It's nothing that can be manipulated. It's something that a student will do entirely on his or her own.
HINOJOSA: Other changes -- verbal analogies will be dropped and so will be quantitative comparisons in math. More critical reading will be added, along with more difficult math including Algebra II.
Outside the College Board, student protesters from NoMoreTests.com pushed to get rid of the SATs altogether.
JOSHUA FISHER, NOMORETESTS.COM: I thought the test was boring and it caused a lot of unnecessary stress. I actually did well because my parents were able to afford a test prep for me.
HINOJOSA: And critics said the changes did not go far enough.
BOB SCHAEFER, FAIR TEST: The causes of this reform, the number of colleges were dropping the test because of the SAT's inaccuracy, its biases and its susceptibility of the coaching. The College Board hasn't addressed any of those in the changes. In fact, they're going to make some of those even worse.
HINOJOSA: The SAT changes were spurred on in part by a threat from the University of California system over a year ago to drop the SATs because they didn't capture how and what students learn in class. And to the charge of bias, the College Board says that the test in and of themselves aren't the problem.
PROF. PATRICK HAYASHI, UCLA: The difference between fairness in a test and fairness in an education system, there is an unequal education system in America and one that we at the College Board are dedicated to doing all we can to change that unfairness.
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WALCOTT: It is every parent's worst nightmare, though most of their kids never dream it could happen to them: violent crime. Statistics show young people are at a high risk of being robbed, beaten or worse. So what, if anything, can a young person do to try to avoid becoming a victim? We have this cautionary look.
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WALCOTT (voice-over): Karen Lupton never thought she could be a victim.
KAREN LUPTON: Everyone who goes through a traumatic experience always thinks this happens to somebody else. This doesn't happen to me.
WALCOTT: But five years ago when she was just 21 years old, Lupton's life changed forever. Early one morning while jogging on a quiet street near her Atlanta home, she was approached by a man in a car.
LUPTON: The driver's side door opened and a man that I had never seen before in my life jumped out and grabbed me and put a knife to my throat and said get in the car.
WALCOTT: The man drove Karen to a secluded area where he sexually assaulted her. It is a scene played out at an alarming rate across the country. In fact, the Bureau of Justice says at least 1 of every 10 young adults and teenagers become the victims of a violent crime. That's more than twice the rate for 25 to 49-year-olds and 11 times higher than people 50 and older. So why the discrepancy? One social psychologist says young people have fewer life experiences and through no fault of their own tend to be less cautious in risky situations.
BARBARA ROTHBAUM, SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGIST: Young people very often feel invincible. They feel invulnerable.
WALCOTT: Especially around their peers and in familiar places like a college campus.
Sergeant R.L. Barrone patrols the George Tech campus.
R.L. BARRONE, POLICE SERGEANT: The one most important thing I'd want to do is find a friend, someone their comfortable with, and make arrangements that if they need to go places or find something out that they go with that person.
WALCOTT: Some other safety precautions. Stick to well-lit, well-traveled areas, especially at night. If you are being followed, head to a populated area and call police. Carry a cell phone. If heading out with a new acquaintance, tell someone where you're going and when you'll be back. And go with your instincts. If a situation feels dangerous, it probably is.
(on camera): Another place where people often feel a false sense of security is their car. When you get in, lock the door, look in the front seat and the back.
(voice-over): Despite our best effort, crime does happen. If you are attacked, get as many details as possible for police.
BARRONE: Study that person, their face, their eyes, their hair. If they have any tattoos, marks, teeth missing, clothes, hats, shoes, anything you can think of and in which way they go when they leave. Did they leave in a car? Did they leave on foot?
WALCOTT: It was that kind of attention to detail that helped police arrest Karen Lupton's attacker. But she says being aware of the world around you is the best first line of defense.
LUPTON: Yes, there are things you can do, but even the best laid plans can go awry. I would -- I mean my advice would be don't think that it can't be you, it can be.
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ANNOUNCER: Exploring our world, here now is CNN STUDENT NEWS "Perspectives."
FRIEDMAN: Since its founding, the United States has been a land of immigrants. America is a melting pot of people of varying cultures and colors. For people new to this country the question of identity and assimilation can sometimes be complex. And for one group of immigrants, the tragic events of last September have made that question even more difficult.
Garrick Utley reports.
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GARRICK UTLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It is a familiar scene. Palestinians watching the violence in the Middle East on Al- Jazeera, the Arab language news channel. You can feel and hear the anger.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All of our community really is very, very mad and very angry about what is happening now.
UTLEY: But this community is on Main Street, Paterson, New Jersey, at least four of the September 11 terrorists lived in Paterson as they planned their attacks.
(on camera): Who lives in this community?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's mostly really Arab-Americans here.
UTLEY (voice-over): Hani Amidala (ph) was born in Jerusalem. He came to the United States more than 30 years ago and teaches chemistry at a local university.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have Palestinians. You have Jordanians, Syrian, Lebanese, some Turkish, few Iraqis.
UTLEY: And as they gather at the Arabic Island Cafe, they say they have never felt more stigmatized for who they are.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Arabs and Muslims actually became somehow, you know, wherever they go, as if there is some kind of a dark mark upon everybody which look Arab or resemble Arabs.
UTLEY (on camera): The story of those who have come to this promise land called America seeking a new life has so often about discrimination and stereotyping followed eventually by assimilation and acceptance. The process of becoming an American is about your identity, to what extent do you cling to an old one or seek a new one.
(voice-over): Tariq Hasan (ph) has faced that question. He lives and works across the Hudson River from Ground Zero. Born in Pakistan, he came to this country as a child. Now is he has changed his name to Terry Hasan (ph).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I mean I'm still the same person just with the name Terry, I'm communicating that as a Muslim, I can also embrace America and still have my Hasan (ph) classic Muslim last name but also an American first name.
UTLEY: There is a long tradition of immigrants Americanizing their names to fit in better. Schmidt becomes Smith. Josepe (ph) turns into Joseph. Since September 11, a small but growing number of Muslims have been changing their names.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everyone has a right to a personal choice. Now maybe that's me being too American or too Western in the sense like of individualism. But I think it's a personal choice.
UTLEY: But at the Arabic Island Cafe, Terry (ph) Hasan's choice is seen as something approaching cultural treason.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: After September 11, I really think that is demeaning and it is not really very courageous. As a matter of fact, I can really call it cowardly.
UTLEY: Terry Hasan is not bothered by what other Muslims think of him. But even with a new name, he says his religion isolates him in American life.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Many people don't know Muslims in their work life. So as a result, people have a stereotype of Muslims they get from world politics. And there's no personal experience for most people to counter that. So my fear is that Muslims are dehumanized, depersonalized.
UTLEY: He is not alone.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a melting pot. A land of immigrants and you want to have our share in it and contribute our share as well.
UTLEY: That has always been the American dream. But for some now, that dream is a little more distant.
Garrick Utley, CNN.
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FRIEDMAN: Two years ago, the American West saw its worst fire season in nearly half a century. But history may have met its match this year. Fires are burning with a vengeance out west, destroying property and disrupting lives.
In our "Week in Review," we have an update on two of the bigger fires burning and a warning from fire officials who say the worst may be yet to come.
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WALCOTT (voice-over): It's the latest battle raging in the American west, wildfires. At last count, 19 infernos scorching more than 900,000 acres in 10 states. Fires fueled by thick underbrush and drought conditions. The biggest of which, not due to an act of God but an act of man.
That inferno, known as the Hayman fire, will go down as the worst in Colorado history. Firefighters say it's nearly under control, but the toll was heavy. The Hayman destroyed more than 600 buildings and cost roughly $28 million. A U.S. Forest Service employee has been charged with deliberately starting that fire while trying to burn a letter from her estranged husband.
Elsewhere in Colorado, a pair of fires north of Durango has taken out 77 buildings at a cost of $16.5 million. It was also one for the history books in Arizona this week where firefighters continue to make headway in that state's largest ever wildfire.
The Rodeo-Chediski fire has scorched more than 640 square miles, threatening the town of Show Low, forcing 30,000 people from their homes.
For some in shelters, the fear of losing everything was almost too much to bear.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because it's a tough situation you know and just -- and I don't know what we expect to see when we get back.
WALCOTT: President Bush offered some words of comfort.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I want you to know that a lot of people in our country are pulling for you. They understand the suffering that families are going through, because of worry about your most precious possession, your home. They understand that a lot of you are living in tents when you'd rather be in your own bed. They cry for you and they hurt with you.
WALCOTT: Firefighters say they have the fire about 5 percent contained. The Forest Service says scenes played out this week in Colorado, Arizona and eight other states could be repeated. They say of the 191 million acres of national forest across the country, about 40 percent of that, a size of the entire state of Arizona, is at risk for severe fire.
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FRIEDMAN: We often hear horror stories about bullying behavior. It can have deep seeded and long-lasting effects on its victims. Bullying can also have a devastating impact on its perpetrators. Such was the case with one California youth.
Our Student Bureau shares his story of consequence and redemption.
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LORI AUFDEMORTE, CNN STUDENT BUREAU (voice-over): In the late 1990s, a different kind of game swept this high school in Orange County, California. It was made up mostly of white, well-to-do teenagers. Police called them a bully gang. They called themselves The Wanderers.
The group lasted through four graduating classes and attracted as many as 100 followers under gang leader Benji Nolot. Classmates say he reigned with a heart of terror.
VANESSA LOPEZ, FORMER CLASSMATE: He had this reputation that just everyone knew. There was air about him that just you stayed away from him. He was a mean guy. He was really tough and he was in charge.
AUFDEMORTE: Sunny Sabahe (ph), who now works at a bank, was a member of The Wanderers in high school. SUNNY SABAHE, THE WANDERERS: It got really big, I mean to the point where when we'd go to Disneyland you know some people heard about us.
AUFDEMORTE: But the group only represented destruction. When Nolot was upset, someone else would get hurt. Like the time at Chapparosa Park when he beat up the leader of an Asian gang.
Today, there are many regrets.
BENJI NOLOT, LEADER OF THE WANDERERS: To go to school for 11 -- over 11.5 years, and then all anybody looks at is did you graduate.
AUFDEMORETE: The Wanderers modeled themselves after the greased hair tough guys in the 1979 movie "The Wanderers," a film about a gang of Italian teens coming of age in 1960s Bronx, New York.
Today, the former leader of The Wanderers is now the leader of a Christian (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
NOLOT: I just cried out to God in my own mind, you know, and not out loud, just in my own mind I just thought this whole time here I'd been thinking that I'd been experiencing freedom and what I thought was freedom God showed me was bondage.
AUFDEMORTE: The people who knew him from high school never predicted such a change.
RYAN HUELIT, CHURCH FRIEND: Here is a guy who would stare at you down the hallway and completely transformed into someone so loving that just amazed me.
SABAHE: I think most of our friends don't think it's going to last -- going to last, because Benji, based like I said, they think he's an extremist and he'll do something and he'll do it for a while like a good year or two.
AUFDEMORTE: Nolot is not the first to make a dramatic change. Such changes are common among inmates, for example, or people who say they had hit the bottom.
Lori Aufdemorte, CNN STUDENT NEWS, Orange County, California.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WALCOTT: That's another week of STUDENT NEWS. Have a great weekend. We'll catch you back here Monday.
FRIEDMAN: Bye-bye.
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