Two conservative justices, who were part of the majority, disavowed that aspect of the opinion. Not everyone agrees that the recent opinion might affect charters. Green does note one reason the Trinity Lutheran logic might not apply to charter schools: They are usually defined in statute as public schools. That means having an affiliation with a religious institution could raise greater church-and-state issues than the Trinity Lutheran case, where a private school was simply seeking to receive a public benefit.
Saiger, though, suggests that the implications of Trinity Lutheran might be even further-reaching than who gets to run a charter school. In his view, the case also raises the possibility of charters that are explicitly religious and teach a sectarian curriculum.
There does not appear to be any data on how many existing charters have a religious association, but the line between church and charter school can be blurry in some cases. For instance, some private Catholic schools have converted into charters ; a report examined 18 schools across three states that had undergone this conversion.
Chalkbeat previously reported on a network of Michigan charter schools run by an organization that used to oversee private Christian schools, some of which converted into charters.
The schools continue to emphasize character traits taken from the Bible, including faithfulness, though the schools no longer explicitly connect them to biblical passages. Vacations take place on Muslim holidays. Most significantly, classes break for early afternoon prayers; almost all students participate, although the school does not officially conduct them. Minnesota, like Michigan, prohibits religious entities from running charters.
The school was eventually forced to shut down in after a state law prohibited out-of-state charter authorizers; it had been overseen by an Islamic humanitarian group based in Washington D. Faulkner, for his part, said that charters should be required to maintain non-religious rules and a secular curriculum.
He believes that religious institutions can do that. Chalkbeat is a nonprofit newsroom dedicated to providing the information families and educators need, but this kind of work isn't possible without your help. Cookie banner We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from.
By choosing I Accept , you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies. We have laws saying that public schools are secular. And our state has a Blaine Amendment that prohibits its government from sending state money to religious schools. Applicant : I think it does. So, we know there is no Establishment Clause concern if religious schools are part of a diverse system of schools receiving government support.
So, we will consider your charter application if and only if your school is completely non-religious in its curriculum, pedagogy, advising, and more. Authorizer : I also read the Espinoza decision! The Court did NOT prohibit states from preventing public money from being used for religious purposes.
Authorizer : In Locke, the Court upheld a government program that said state scholarships could be used at religious colleges but could not be used by students to pursue religious training. But it was just a concurrence, not the decision of the full Court. And no one else signed it—Gorsuch was alone among his colleagues in that view. So, the Court very conspicuously preserved the right of states to maintain education initiatives that prevent money from going to religious groups for some types of religious activities.
Since religion would be woven into everything your school does, we will deny your charter application because any state money running through a religious charter school would support religious activities.
Applicant : And for the social-justice charter school that you authorize, do you allow the texts of progressive and anti-racist writers inform its hiring and instruction? Applicant : Thank you for your time. In my view, your positions clearly single out religion for exclusionary treatment. I plan to file a lawsuit. Authorizer : Our policies maintain public education as a secular enterprise, and, by preventing the entanglement of government and religion, follow the longstanding understanding of the Establishment Clause.
We will see you in court. Sign in. Log into your account. A chain of charters in New York that offered a Hebrew-language curriculum were said to be promoting Judaism. And in some states, financially strapped Roman Catholic schools have pulled down crucifixes, promised to stop teaching religion, and converted to publicly funded charters, retaining the same student body and staff. The charter concept has always had its critics.
Little evidence exists that charters out-perform traditional public schools, and in fact some may do worse. Many opponents fear that charters are designed to get Americans comfortable with the idea of privatizing secondary education or grease the skids for vouchers. Charters could be what they were intended to be—a supplement to traditional public schools—but only if they are subjected to proper forms of oversight and regulation.
Regulation seems to be a dirty word in much of the United States these days. Education officials have a responsibility to ensure that the operators of charter schools understand that their institutions are part of the public system.
These schools should also be subjected to the same curriculum checks as traditional public schools. If state education officials had been doing their jobs, they would have known that RES was pushing creationism and would have put a stop to it before it reached the classroom. These schools also need to be subjected to the same quality-control measures that are imposed on other public schools.
Standardized testing and other efforts at accountability are all the rage in public education right now.
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