Actor Will Smith is funding his own private school that will teach youngsters using an educational system devised in part by the Scientology cult. The curriculum at Smith's New Village Academy of Calabasas, on which he has spent nearly £500,000, uses different educational theories including "study technology" – a learning method developed by L Ron Hubbard, the founder of the Church of Scientology. Websites dedicated to monitoring Scientologist activity are also claiming that at least six members of staff employed at ...

A proposed taxpayer-funded pilot school linked to an arm of the controversial Church of Scientology has scored a $20,000 grant from a blue-chip Hub charitable foundation, the Herald has learned. The Boston Foundation recently awarded the planning grant to the proposed "Cornerstone for Success Academy," a high school for at-risk students that would base its curriculum on a model created by Applied Scholastics International - the educational arm of the Church of Scientology. The celebrity-backed religious organization is often criticized as ...

La scientologie est une entreprise ultramoderne qui a aussi des activités séculières. Par exemple, en 1966, Ron Hubbard fondait avec un collègue Narconon une cure de désintoxication qui compte aujourd'hui plus d'une centaine de centres dans le monde, dont un à Trois-Rivières. En plus d'être une cure de désintoxication, Narconon s'est donné pour mission d'instruire les jeunes sur les méfaits de la drogue en donnant des conférences dans de nombreuses écoles de la province. L'atelier offert dans les écoles, appelé La ...

Their targets used to be university students, but today fringe religious groups are believed to be recruiting school-aged children. Lynne Wallis reports. If one of your pupils became distant, distracted and antisocial, your first thought might be that they were experimenting with drink or drugs. But religious cults pose another danger to young people, and one from which it can be equally difficult to extricate them. Although the notion of children being lured into fringe religious organisations might seem far-fetched, it ...

TAMPA, Florida (CNN) — Some Christian congregations, particularly in lower income, urban areas, are turning to an unlikely source for help — the Church of Scientology. Scientologists do not worship God, much less Jesus Christ. The church has seen plenty of controversy and critics consider it a cult. So why are observant Christians embracing some of its teachings? Two pastors who spoke recently with CNN explained that when it comes to religion, they still preach the core beliefs of Christianity. But ...

UNIFORMED police distributed Church of Scientology propaganda at Whyalla High School, contrary to guidelines for religious education. A team of police officers visiting the school showed classes a DVD on living a moral life and distributed a booklet entitled "Whyalla High School presents the way to happiness, a common-sense guide for better living", written by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. One outraged parent who did not wish to be named said she had explicitly told the school her children were not ...

Last month, the School Board sent a warning to parents about the “harmful effects” of drugs used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Much of the flier’s information was taken from the Internet, including from a Web site run by a group founded by the Church of Scientology. This week, six national organizations and eight local groups sent a letter requesting that the School Board retract the flier and send a new one stating that ADHD is a disease that requires ...

Hollywood, Tel Aviv is right behind you: Artists, businesspeople and middle-class seekers are filling the classrooms of local Scientology centers, hoping to rid themselves of excess spiritual baggage. Opera singer Gaby Sade used to have a very short fuse. If someone cut him off, he was capable of getting out of the car and giving the offending driver more than a piece of his mind. If if did not come to blows, he would at least tell him, in choice language, ...

Bishop E.L. Warren says the goal is far-reaching, but so is the problem it is addressing. "The purpose of this is to eradicate illiteracy and provide a new place of learning and hope in downtown Quincy," he said. Warren, who pastors the Cathedral of Worship, 215 N. 25th, and is the head of E.L. Warren Ministries International, said earlier this week that Quincy will be the headquarters of the Vision Literacy Center. There will be 52 learning centers around the world, ...

The controversial Church of Scientology is planning to target students at Scottish universities and colleges in a new recruitment drive. Leaders of the church, which is largely regarded as a cult and believes humans descended from aliens, have revealed they intend to send workers into campuses to seek out impressionable youngsters. Ironically, they believe recent bad publicity after the movement featured on the BBC's Panorama programme has helped attract new converts. Following the programme screening two weeks ago, which featured presenter ...

As Chad Bloom can attest from firsthand experience, the Narconon rehab program can bring ‘ice’ addicts back to live a productive, drug-free life Lari Zelinsky-Bloom is proud of her recent graduate. No ceremony or lei hail his achievement, but thanks to celebrities Kelly Preston and John Travolta, there will be many others to follow in the footsteps of her son, 21-year-old Chad Bloom. Chad just graduated from Narconon, a drug rehabilitation center. After a harrowing nightmare suffering the effects of ice ...

[Professor David Touretzky appears on the Glenn Beck show to discuss Scientology's increased encroachment into public classrooms. They are attempting to "Safepoint" Scientology which means to get the cult better accepted into society. Let's try to stop that until they reform.]

TAMPA — The red letters on the white sign in front of the Glorious Church of God in Christ read "Free Tutoring in the C.L. Kennedy Center." An arrow points to a building behind the church. Every afternoon after school, as many as 42 Hillsborough County public school students gather for tutoring in reading and math skills. Most start with a Learning to Learn course, which teaches the basics of L. Ron Hubbard's how-to-study program. The tutors, all wearing red vests, ...

Here's a word problem for you: There are two tutoring programs in a Wichita school. One is very structured, complete with math worksheets and teachers giving direction. The other focuses on helping students explore learning with such techniques as playing with dough. Both are part of a $1 million federally mandated experiment. Which one will be the most effective in raising students' assessment test scores? Answer: No one will know until next year. And that's the real problem, some local educators ...

Here's a word problem for you: There are two tutoring programs in a Wichita school. One is very structured, complete with math worksheets and teachers giving direction. The other focuses on helping students explore learning with such techniques as playing with dough. Both are part of a $1 million federally mandated experiment. Which one will be the most effective in raising students' assessment test scores? Answer: No one will know until next year. And that's the real problem, some local educators ...

A HUMAN rights youth forum at Parliament House in Sydney promoted the views of the Scientology founder, L. Ron Hubbard, and was organised by a group linked to the Church of Scientology. In a kit given to students, Hubbard's photograph was more prominent than those of the human rights activists Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Thomas Jefferson. Hubbard's quotes were littered through the material. The Church of Scientology is the major sponsor of Youth for Human Rights Australia, ...

Scientologists are taking advantage of Germany's education problems for their own ends: They are luring weak students by providing after-school tutoring. Education authorities in Germany are on alert. The ad on a supermarket notice board in the city of Essen was aimed at all the parents in the neighborhood. Right nearby there was an "alternative school" where learning was still fun. "Sounds just right", thought one dad, who is now reluctant to give his name out of sheer fear. He took ...

At first glance, it seemed like a classic David-and-Goliath punch-up: Danielle Lavigueur, a separated mother of two living in Longueuil, on Montreal's South Shore, claims the high school her 12-year-old son Gabriel attends is pressuring her to medicate him with Ritalin for hyperactivity. She refuses to yield to the alleged demand, and eventually someone calls in the Children's Aid Society. Feeling besieged, Lavigueur confides in a friend, who introduces her to Raphaël Huppé, head of research for the Montreal-based National Parents ...

The faded little downtown area of Clearwater, Florida, has a beauty salon, a pizza parlor and one or two run-down bars, as well as a bunch of withered bungalows and some old storefronts that look as if they haven't seen customers in years. There are few cars and almost no pedestrians. There are, however, buses — a fleet of gleaming white and blue ones that slowly crawl through town, stopping at regular intervals to discharge a small army of tightly organized, ...

Los Angeles city school officials were caught off guard this week by the Church of Scientology's role in an upcoming event at a South Los Angeles high school, which, while not illegal, is considered unusual. On Monday, teenagers from about 25 countries are expected to meet with students at Jordan High School in Watts for a conference on human rights. The gathering is part of a three-day event organized by Youth for Human Rights International — a group with close ties ...

When prospective students tour GW, one of the things they learn is how easy it is to start an organization. Tour guides chirp about the school's most famous alumni - Colin Powell and Jackie O, of course, and if the tour guide is feeling daring, he might throw Watergate's "Deep Throat" into the mix. But one name that prospective students do not hear is that of L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of the Church of Scientology. Perhaps it's because students are ...

If a high-ranking LAPD official can be believed, perhaps the Scientology-affiliated The Way To Happiness should take a page from its own teachings. Two of the Glendale-based nonprofit organization’s 21 guides to achieving happiness are “Be Worthy of Trust” and “Seek to Live the Truth,” neither of which were followed apparently in the group’s dealings with the LAPD and a city in Texas. Officials with the group, which over the past two decades has distributed booklets of the same name to ...

A drug program run by Scientologists and labelled dangerous by medical authorities is being given free rein at dozens of Melbourne schools. The controversial Narconon group gave a speech at Melbourne High on Sunday and has made classroom presentations at Melbourne schools including MacRobertson Girls High. The group – which does not disclose its Scientology background to schools – gives students booklets that condemn prescription drugs and equate coffee with heroin. "All drugs are basically poison . . . Two or ...

COOPER: It's no secret that Tom Cruise is a devoted, outspoken member of the Church of Scientology. That has not always been the case. There was a time when the subject of his religion was off limits to reporters and to interviewers. Not so now. Just ask Matt Lauer who got lectured by Cruise weeks ago on what the actors says are the evils of psychiatry. Now, while some are surprised by the chance in Cruise, former Scientologists insist it's really ...

The controversial church, whose founder called shrinks "terrorists" and which labels mental illness a fraud, is closer than you think to implanting its extreme beliefs in the nation's laws and schools. It may be easy to dismiss Tom Cruise's recent outbursts against psychiatry as the ravings of an egomaniacal celebrity. Comedians have certainly had a field day with Cruise, a fervent disciple of the Church of Scientology, ever since he scolded Brooke Shields for taking prescribed medication to treat her postpartum ...

Question: What ever happened to the Narconon anti-drug prevention program interested in holding presentations at Hawaii's public schools? Answer: State Department of Education officials are not allowing Narconon presentations at public schools. In February, state education officials stopped Narconon's drug prevention and education presentations at public schools on Oahu after Narconon received a negative evaluation by the California Department of Education. The California evaluation "found that the program offered inaccurate and unscientific information and was inconsistent with research-based practices." Based on ...

Bills in the state Legislature that aim to keep students from receiving psychiatric treatment bear the familiar marks of Scientology. L. Ron Hubbard was a science fiction writer before he decided, more than a half-century ago, to publish his views on mental health. Now, apparently, his adherents are writing Florida law. Two bills aimed at schoolchildren that are winding their way through the Legislature bear a familiar Hubbard trademark. They hold the practice of modern mental health medicine in contempt and, ...

The California Medical Association has declared unanimous support for school districts that have dropped Narconon and other "factually inaccurate approaches" to antidrug instruction from their classrooms, and will urge the American Medical Association to do the same. Nearly 500 California doctors also endorsed "scientifically based drug education in California schools" at the association's annual meeting in Anaheim on Monday. Narconon, a drug education program with links to the Church of Scientology, is offered free to schools and has been used in ...