It comes into effect in 2006, leaving some teachers scrambling to comply.Few states have laws that can punish teachers for lying about credentials.The teachers in Georgia have maintained that they earned their degrees from Saint Regis in good faith, although six have resigned. It, too, says there has been a huge amount of support from the family members of American servicemen.One letter in particular, printed last week, caught the eye It was from Jean Gray of Richmond, Virginia “Thank you!” she wrote. “The photograph was supposed to show the respect,” he says, speaking from the town of Everett, where he is a part-time student. “It was supposed to be a comfort.”Her sister, Toni Silicio, is adamant that Tami acted with the best of intentions “I was not surprised,” she says of her sister’s actions. “In the last month the fighting has been increasing, [with] a large number of men killed.

I think she was taken aback by the prayers and saluting and wanted the families to know that the coffins were being treated well.”For all the goodwill of her family, perhaps the most important voices of support have come from the families of some of the soldiers killed. “I have had letters from the families whose sons and daughters have died They have been very supportive,” she says. “We have had so much positive feedback, heart to heart – and that picture was taken from my heart.”The Seattle Times, while regretting that Silicio lost her job as a result of its scoop, is satisfied that it has behaved honourably. One of the pictures she took would find its way on to the front page of her home-town newspaper, and from there to newspapers around the world – a haunting image that summed up the rising death-toll of American troops in Iraq.More important, her action would put her at odds with a White House effort to censor such images of home-bound US coffins. There are certain aspects to President Bush’s bloody and deadly war with the “terrorists”, it seems, that he would rather the American public does not get to see.Now back in the US, where she is looking for a new job, Silicio is amazed at the controversy her picture has generated Yet she has no regrets about what she did. Speaking out about what happened to her and the way she has been treated, she tells me: “This has nothing to do with politics It was not about politics. But despite the benefits it was clear that among some residents there was a price to pay for the area acquiring the good quality of life cited in the government report.Soaring house prices and a creeping rise in crime rate were among the main complaints of those who have known the area for decades.

Lynn Harden, 38, who works in the local shop Pet Fayre, described her surprise at the findings of the report: “I think the place has changed and there is a lot of crime,” she said “There was a robbery at the bank a few weeks ago. I used to work in the newsagents down the road and I was held up with a knife.”I was born in the area but I’ve had to move out because house prices are unbelievable. I’m sure that the people who move here think it’s a nice, quaint little village but it has become expensive.”Concerns surrounding property prices were reflected in the fact that the average cost of a four-bedroom detached property was around £500,000, according to Janet Roberts, secretary at a local estate agents. Silicio wants to work in some sort of humanitarian field, perhaps for a non-governmental organisation.As they look to pick up their lives, she can rely on the support of her family in Washington State, including her 21-year-old son, Will Taylor. “I can’t say for sure, but I know there was a lot of pressure [from the Pentagon].”Having both lost their $70,000-a-year jobs, Silicio and her husband are now looking for new careers. “I was told that the picture went to the top and so there was no choice [for Maytag],” she says.

But it was too late: newspapers around the world were quick to publish the photographs the Bush administration very clearly did not want people to see. “Quite frankly, we don’t want the remains of our service members who have made the ultimate sacrifice to be the subject of any kind of attention that is unwarranted or undignified,” John Moline, a Deputy Undersecretary of Defense, told reporters at a Pentagon briefing.Silicio is taken back by the administration’s attitude; by its apparent involvement in the dismissal of her and her husband from their jobs, and by its claim that the picture ban was requested by the families of those who had died. Later, however, the Pentagon said the decision to release the pictures had been made in error and ordered that no more images be provided. thememoryhole ) obtained more than 300 pictures of the coffins of dead servicemen under a Freedom of Information Act request. The same week Silicio’s picture appeared, the Memory Hole news website ( www.