School

Indiana highschool teacher Connie Heermann has been suspended for teaching The Freedom Writers Diary, despite having written permission from 150 parents to let students read the book. Apparently a single board member objected to strong language in the text, and convinced the rest of the board to ban the book.

Nothing speaks louder than a story that makes you think, laughs and sad, a story that speaks to you and makes it impossible to put it down. It's beyond me that a story like this could go under the radar and not be picked by the powers that be. It pulls you into the story in ways I haven't seen before.

For winning, the students won $500 to spend on resources for the school’s library.
They also get to sell the book through the school as a fund raiser… hope they get the kids something cool with it.