The case of John Freshwater has been discussed extensively in the blogosphere. Steve Goble, of the Mansfield (OH) News-Journal, cuts through the hysterical cries of "Freshwater's being persecuted because he's a Christian" and reminds us of a few salient points: that Freshwater burned a cross into a student's arm and that his science teaching was questionable at best.

My husband has fond memories of living in Mansfield during part of his childhood. It's a gorgeous town with oodles of hills and trees, plenty of storm sewers for kids to play in(!), and a lush botanical garden. When he was 8, my husband had set up a small telescope on the deck in the backyard and was teaching the neighborhood kids about the stars. He headed up a biker's gang, one that patrolled the streets carrying first-aid kits to help kids who'd wiped out on their bicycles. To this day, he speaks highly of the gifted-talented program in the Mansfield schools during that era. All in all, it sounds like Mansfield was a good place to be a high-energy kid.

Down the road in Mt. Vernon, in the domain of John Freshwater? Not so much, it seems. The community seems to be beset with teachers who've confused their classrooms for chapels, and the fact that it's taken years for Freshwater to face any consequences for his actions doesn't speak well for the school or district administration. Perhaps those administrators feared rocking the boat, or maybe they were complicit in Freshwater's mission. Either way, a generation of students has been taught that evolution is a lie, that creationism is valid science, and that it's laudable for a public school teacher to push his beliefs on his captive audience in a perverted sense of "academic freedom."

Steve Goble reminds us what academic freedom really means, with added bolding: