Detroit teachers' sick-out marks Rosa Parks anniversary

Tuesday would have been a great opportunity for students to learn and be inspired by the story of Rosa Parks, one of the key figures of the civil rights movement, at three Detroit government schools. It was the sixtieth anniversary of Parks' refusal to give up her seat on the Montgomery, Alabama city-owned bus pictured on the left--which is now on display at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan--to a white man. That act of civil disobedience led to the Montgomery Bus Boycott which ended when the threw out its race-based bus seating law.

Shortly after the boycott ended, Parks moved to Detroit where she died ten years ago.

But because of a sick-out at Detroit Public Schools, three of its schools were forced to close on this historic day because of a shortage of teachers. The teachers, who of course were paid to play sick, are angry about Gov. Rick Snyder's school reform proposals.

One DPS teacher said that December 1 was chosen for the sick-out as a way to mark the Parks anniversary. Other teachers and student protesters referred to state management of DPS as "the back of the bus treatment."

The teachers deserve an F.