SCHOLASTIC (www.scholastic.com) HAS OMITTED the "PERSIAN EMPIRE" in its SCHOOL REFERENCE BOOKS

Petition Online:

PERSIAN EMPIRE WAS OMITTED IN THE SCHOLASTIC www.scholastic.com ANNUAL

SUPPLEMENT BOOKS

A) Please distribute/forward this petition as broadly as it is humanly possible and encourage ALL, Persian/Iranian compatriots, as well as our extended colleagues, friends, and families worldwide but especially in the US to go to:

http://www.petitiononline.com/071056/petition.html

B) and sign the petition. Individualized comments added to the petition are very helpful. Also, everyone should go to the Scholastic website at www.scholastic.com and send them his/her sentiments, too by clicking on the [About us] button and then by clicking on the [Contact us] button... (Call or send email to them).

C) Finally, rerun this email several times during the week or so as our target is to exceed the 100,000 signatures collected for the National Geographic petition, albeit the Persian Gulf triumph!

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View Current Signatures - Sign the Petition

To: Scholastic, Inc

PERSIAN EMPIRE WAS OMITTED IN THE SCHOLASTIC (http://www.scholastic.com/) ANNUAL SUPPLAMENT BOOKS

WE, the undersigned worldwide comprised of academicians and artists, professors and scholars, historians and other independent thinkers do hereby register our grave dismay with the [biased] recent publishing of the annual supplement to the twenty volume, The New Book of Knowledge, in which the passages on the Persian Empire and the citations of the Persian Empire on the chronological timeline were entirely wiped out. Whereas we have mostly benefited with acknowledgment from procurement and usage of Scholastic products in the past and further, have reciprocated to its mission by contributing articles and promoting its multifaceted products and articles, we are not any longer certain as to why we should not actively seek alternatives after such egregious action.

Paradoxically, Scholastic Corporation (http://www.scholastic.com/) albeit their recently acquired subsidiaries, Grolier, Inc. responsible for publishing the New Book of Knowledge, may claim that justice to citations on the Persian Empire has indeed been served in the actual twenty volumes as well as their online resources; that is in part correct, as for instance the word Persian and Iran do appear in nearly 2500 locations on more than one hundred on line pages of their web resources, but the shear fact remains that the 2005 twenty volume has already been impacted by diminishing the prominence of the Persian Civilization. Accordingly The burden still remains on the Scholastic which can not still justify the blatant omission of the passages on the Persian Empire or its wiping out from the timeline in the supplement in lieu of the fact that the coverage of world civilization has now increased from the last year’s 15 to 22 pages, and it now includes many substantially smaller civilizations. Furthermore, it is also a simple fact that most parents and many schools can not afford to purchase the entire 20 volumes but rather have direct access to the only the one supplement that has now opted to omit an otherwise extremely significant page from history. Such omission can not be discounted as a simple “inadvertent oversight”, but rather a measured step taken by the editorial board.

Scholastic, claims to be”the global children’s publishing and media company 80 years in the making” as a worldwide corporation for publishing school related textbooks, references and educational materials. To remain committed to its won business and education missions, it must adhere to a set of standard that is inclusive and sensitive to multi-culturalism and universal diversity. Accordingly, it should not venture into rewriting history, but rather narrating it as objectively and comprehensively as it is possible. Epitomizing, with the proper rectification and resolution of this matter by Scholastic, the community aspires to reconsider reinstating its support for Scholastic products. Respectfully submitted, The Global Concerned Scholars on SCHOLASTIC Conduct.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned