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This question is about public schools from the first grade through High School. If the issue of religion was never even brought up by an atheist teacher and they stuck to the textbooks they were teaching from would it bother you to know that an atheist might be teaching your child?
When I was a Freshman at Montana Tech I had this great professor in a literature class who openly talked about his atheism. He was the first person that I can recall in my life who told me they were an atheist. This was in 1967 so that would have seemed much more radical to most people but I had realized before I took this class that I was also an atheist so I was very interested in what he had to say. Of course college is very different from public schools and I would imagine that an atheist teacher who taught the sixth grade for example would probably keep their mouth shut about it. Any thoughts?
For k-12, I would like both religious and atheist/agnostic teachers to keep their personal faith or lack thereof to themselves.
eidt: Obviously, being an atheist I would not object to an atheist teacher. I would also not object to a deeply religious teacher. In both cases, I would expect them to teach their assigned subject and not discuss personal faith-related issues.
For k-12, I would like both religious and atheist/agnostic teachers to keep their personal faith or lack thereof to themselves.
That's exactly how I feel. I don't think either point of view has any place in a public school if a teacher is trying to influence their students to accept their particular beliefs. I have had teachers growing up who talked about God and religion but that was in a different era in the 50's and 60's and none of them were overbearing about it. I pretty much liked almost all of the teachers I had.
It'd be nice if both sides kept their mouth shut and let the kids be kids.
Soon enough they'll discover that religion is a big joke. It's just like Santa Claus.
I would think a reasonable teacher who happens to be an atheist would not have reason to talk to his/her students about his/her lack of beliefs concerning religion, just as a religious teacher should not have a reason. I wouldn't have a problem with that.
This question is about public schools from the first grade through High School. If the issue of religion was never even brought up by an atheist teacher and they stuck to the textbooks they were teaching from would it bother you to know that an atheist might be teaching your child?
I guess it would depend on the textbook. I wouldn't want my child taught religion by an atheist, but I can't think of a single solitary reason why an atheist wouldn't make just as good an English, math, or geography teacher as a theist.
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I wouldn't want my child taught religion by an atheist, but I can't think of a single solitary reason why an atheist wouldn't make just as good an English, math, or geography teacher as a theist.
