"You just cannot shut down student speech like that," states French, who explains that Lopez was well within the confines of his professor's assignment, and that the professor's actions not only constitute viewpoint discrimination but also comprise "retaliation" because he disagreed with Lopez's religious beliefs.When Mr. Lopez complained of censorship, he was threatened with expulsion by the professor. Professor Matteson eventually refused to grade his speech writing on the evaluation form:
"Ask God what your grade is."Jonathon Lopez has filed a law suit against his professor for violating his right to free speech. A few days ago, I shared about the Lost Art of Civility and that was at issue here, but what is our Christian answer to this lost art? Christian: we need to prepare our children and ourselves to be effective in standing up in grace for our rights to free speech. I don't know the full situation, but perhaps he could have said something at the time that would have persuaded the professor to allow him to continue. Perhaps he could have discussed the matter effectively with the professor afterward. I would suspect that a young man in his first speech class was woefully unprepared to handle such an encounter as many Christian students are. This is exactly why I prepared my daughter before she went to college. I know how those in academia can be because I have read stories like this for the past several years. Situations like this one are why statistics show that up to 80% of Christian students who enter college come out 1-4 years later saying they are no longer born again. And this is also why I teach the Christian community effective communication. If you are looking for a creative and fun way to begin this training with your family, please check out Art of Eloquence studies. From JoJo’s Purple Crayon
Learning Speech Communication Skills
can ALSO be fun with Art of Eloquence!