20 people . . .

. . . who would have been ineligible to graduate from Black River Public School:

1. Joseph Chamberlain , British statesman; 2. Grover Cleveland , U.S. president; 3. Joseph Conrad , British author; 4. Aaron Copland , U.S. composer; 5. Hart Crane , U.S. poet; 6. Eugene Debs , U.S. socialist leader; 7. Amelia Earhart , U.S. aviator; 8. Paul Gauguin , French painter; 9. Kahlil Gibran , Syrian author and painter; 10. Ernest Hemingway , U.S. author; 11. Rudyard Kipling , British author; 12. Abraham Lincoln , U.S. president; 13. H. L. Mencken , U.S. editor and journalist; 14. John D. Rockefeller , U.S. oil magnate; 15. Eleanor Roosevelt , U.S. lecturer, author, and humanitarian; 16. George Bernard Shaw , British playwright and critic; 17. Dylan Thomas , British poet; 18. Harry S Truman , U.S. president; 19. George Washington , U.S. president; 20. Virginia Woolf , British author. (Wallechinsky/Wallace, The Book of Lists , p. 277)

[List borrowed from here.]

You see; if you don't apply to, and get accepted to, a four-year college, Black River Public School won't let you have a diploma.

Plan on going to a two-year college near home right after high school, then transferring to a four-year university to save money? Tough titties.

Single mom at age 19 returning to high school just to get a diploma after making the very bad choice of dropping out? Too bad, so sad.

Already got a career lined up at your dad's company and you'll never NEED a college diploma? Tough shit.

Black River isn't just a Forced-Labor Camp or a Government Indoctrination Center; it's also the Center for the Advancement of Educational Bureaucracy! Is Black River going to cover the fees and other costs incurred during the application process? I doubt it.

Contact info for Black River Public School administration, who apparently need to be reminded that they should not stick their noses where their noses don't belong:

email -- ruth@blackriverwebs.com or angererd@blackriver.spfs.k12.mi.us

(They may have intentionally botched the second one to keep from having to read email about this subject. The guy's last name is Angerer, so you might also send one to angerer@blackriver.spfs.k12.mi.us)

Black River Public Schools
491 Columbia Avenue
Holland, MI 49423
Phone (616) 355-0055
Fax (616) 355-0057

There's a whole list of phone extensions here.