Asian-American Community Wants Lunar New Year on School Calendar
Recently, a pair of Muslim holidays was added to the school calendar. This decision was, naturally, met with quite a bit of resistance from non-Muslims. Many believe that school holidays that involve a religious preference should apply to members of that religion only and not create a school-wide day off. But that’s not currently the case. Now, riding off of the Muslim win, the Asian community in NYC is trying to get the Lunar New Year added to the calendar as well.
Considering that the two main religions to have official school holidays are Islam and Judaism, it would seem to make sense that the Lunar New Year be included. The population of Asian-Americans in the NY area certainly overwhelms Muslim numbers and likely the Jewish numbers as well. Plus, the Lunar New Year involves serious travelling and planning and students and teachers are going to miss it whether the school system likes it or not. So what’s one more holiday? One thing’s for certain - the Asian-American community of NYC isn’t likely to back down from this fight anytime soon.
Photo courtesy of Patrick Kwan via Wikicommons