EDGERTON -- Students at Edgerton High School will continue to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in English most of the time -- but sometimes in Spanish.
After an emotional meeting of the Edgerton School Board, which attracted a crowd so large that the session had to be moved from the usual meeting room to the school cafeteria, board members voted unanimously to support the administration's experiment in bilingual patriotism.
That settled a controversy that stirred up in March and eventually went national, with media outlets around the country focusing attention on how the community that straddles the line between Rock and Dane counties -- and that has long been known as a Norwegian-American bastion -- would address a unique variation on the debate over whether this is an "English-Only" country.
The pledge is recited daily over the Edgerton High School's public address system, as is required by state law. Most days, the recitation is in English. But, at the request of students in a foreign-language class, a determination was made to allow an occasional repetition of the patriotic statement in Spanish.
That brought objections from some parents and from some older veterans in the community, who claimed that reciting the pledge in any language other than English was disrespectful of those who had served in the military in the past and are currently serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.
As it turned out, not all veterans agreed.
One of the first speakers of the evening was Jennifer Malinski, an Edgerton High School Class of 1991 graduate who served eight years in the U.S. Army. Recalling that "every day I put on my uniform I worked shoulder to shoulder with dozens of Spanish-speaking soldiers," Malinski told the board, "I would not refuse these Spanish-speaking soldiers the right to say the pledge in whatever language came to their lips, and I hope to God that we don't do that here."
Most of the people in the crowd of 70 applauded.
But the agreement was not universal. Jolene Churchill of Janesville told the board that "non-Spanish-speaking individuals are offended" by "this social experiment by some district employees." Al Decker, a member of the Edgerton American Legion post, suggested that, "When you start saying the pledge in other languages, it hurts soldiers currently serving in the military."
But Dave Calkins, a Vietnam veteran who served 22 years in the military before becoming a 6th-grade social studies teacher at Edgerton, disagreed. He read a note from his son, Davey, who is currently serving his third combat tour in the U.S. military. In it, the Edgerton High School graduate said he served with Spanish-speaking troops and said, "Their commitment is equal to mine." Davey Calkins added with regard to the pledge, "Any way you say it, it's still a pledge ... It's the commitment that matters."
The board agreed, with member Jim Raymond moving to affirm the decisions of Dr. Norman Fjelstad, who had defended the bilingual approach by saying, "In my view, to not allow this supports discrimination of a heritage that has as much right in a nation of immigrants as any Norwegian, German, or other language."
"I don't think the administration overdid this at all," said Raymond, whose sentiments were echoed by fellow board members -- all of whom expressed their sentiments in English.
http://www.madison.com/tct/news/stories/283724
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