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religious schools

Time for faith-based charter schools

John E. Coons July 23, 2019

Like every traditional “private” school, charter schools are held to basic legislated standards of curriculum and safety with one major exception. For better or worse, the most serious governmental imposition on the charter school has been the exclusion of religion.

The teachers unions have discovered that charter schools are enemies of the good society.

Bernie Sanders is with them, warning us that these institutions are anti-democratic and must be brought to heel – that is, in reality, to the heel of the union, which insists that charter schools are essentially private and threatening to work evil among the poor in our cities.

And private they are in varying degrees depending to some extent upon the terms of their particular compact. The point of the original charter concept (1971) was to aid the liberation of the low-income parent and child from subordination to those unchosen strangers from government and union who control the self-styled “public” school located in their compulsory attendance zone.

Charter schools were to give the poor a taste of the personal and civic responsibility enjoyed by wealthier Americans who can and do freely cluster in chosen government schools in the suburbs or pay tuition in the private sector.

Like every traditional “private” school, the charter is held to basic legislated standards of curriculum and safety with one major exception. For better or worse, the most serious governmental imposition on the charter school has been the exclusion of religion.

Though the parental choice among charter schools is completely free, the schools themselves are unfree either to recognize or reject God. They must secure their students’ ears, eyes and thoughts from any suggestion of the divine, either positive or negative, with all the predictable effects of this upon the child’s mind.

In many states, this censorship is defended as a requirement of 19^th century “Blaine Amendments” to the state constitution forbidding public aid to religion. The non-Blaine charter states have accepted this intellectual taboo as the norm and as the diktat of the union.

Given relevant precedent and the seeming attitudes of a majority of the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court, there seems no barrier under the federal constitution to the extension of the state’s authority to subsidize its parents’ choice of religious charter schools. The larger question will be whether the states are forbidden by our national law to actually exclude aid to the subsidized choice of such schools by parents. Next term, the Court will consider Espinoza vs. Montana Dept. of Revenue, presenting this very issue.

If we have vouchers, must they be for the choice of all legitimate schools? Here the school and parent may one day have reason to thank the teachers union for its clear insight that the charter school is indeed private.

July 23, 2019 0 comment

Court showdown over religious freedom looms

Patrick R. Gibbons July 16, 2019

Patrick R. Gibbons

A recent court ruling in Montana appears to be at odds with an earlier decision, where the U.S. Supreme Court determined that Missouri could not deny a church access to public funds for playground safety simply because the organization was religious.

After nearly two decades of debate, the U.S. Supreme Court will finally get a chance to determine how state courts may interpret “Blaine Amendments.”

The court in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris (2002) previously had ruled state school voucher programs do not violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. But whether state constitution “Blaine Amendments” could be used to deny voucher programs remained unresolved.

“Blaine Amendments” are 19^th century vestiges of America’s anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant past. Today, 37 states have amendments to their constitutions preventing religious institutions from indirectly, or in some places like Florida, directly receiving state aid.

These amendments originally were adopted to prevent Catholics from establishing their own publicly funded schools. At the time, public schools provided religious instruction exclusively using the Protestant Bible.

Today, champions of this provision claim it protects “separation of church and state,” but critics see discrimination, and argue that it violates the First Amendment as well as the government’s duty to remain neutral with respect to religious practices.

A review of Blaine could have come more than a decade ago, when lawyers debating the constitutionality of Florida’s first voucher program argued over the state’s “No Aid” provision before the Florida Supreme Court in 2005. However, fearing being overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court, Florida’s Supreme Court dodged the question and invented entirely new reasons to strike down the program.

The U.S. Supreme Court was denied a second opportunity to review state Blaine Amendments after the teacher’s union poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into the Douglas County, Colo., school board race to eliminate the district’s private school voucher program.

But the third time’s a charm.

In 2015, Montana created a tax-credit scholarship program to help families afford private schools, some of which were religious. The Department of Revenue responded by excluding religious private schools from participating in the program. Parents sued, claiming discrimination.

But on Dec. 12, 2018, in a 5-2 ruling, the Montana Supreme Court invalidated the entire program because students could use scholarships to attend private religious schools, making Montana the first state to strike down a tax-credit scholarship program.

The decision surprised and alarmed many.

“The Montana Supreme Court’s ruling … would seem to imply that the private choices of citizens about how to spend or donate their money are indeed the government’s business,” wrote University of Colorado at Colorado Springs professor Joshua Dunn.

Montana’s ruling appears to be at odds with the recent Trinity Lutheran v. Comer (2017) decision, where the U.S. Supreme Court determined that Missouri could not deny a church access to public funds for playground safety simply because the organization was religious.

Indeed, one of the dissenting justices in Montana quoted the Trinity decision: “The exclusion of a group from a public benefit for which it is otherwise qualified, solely because it is a church, is odious to our Constitution.”

The case is expected to be argued before the U.S. Supreme Court next year, with a decision coming by summer 2020.

July 16, 2019 0 comment

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revisitED: Sex, drugs and school choice

Ron Matus May 4, 2019

Ron Matus

When it comes to its education system, the Netherlands decided nearly a century ago to end long-running religious strife over schools and let 1,000 flowers bloom. The Dutch system of universal school choice gives full government funding to public and private schools, including all manner of faith-based schools.

The Netherlands decided nearly a century ago to end long-running religious strife over schools and let 1,000 flowers bloom. The Dutch system of universal school choice gives full government funding to public and private schools, including all manner of faith-based schools. (Image from Wikimedia Commons)

Editor’s note: This month, redefinED is revisiting the best examples of our Voucher Left series, which focuses on the center-left roots of school choice. Today’s post explores one of the world’s most robust systems of government-funded private school choice in a country known as a progressive’s paradise: the Netherlands.

By common definitions, the Netherlands is a very liberal place. Prostitution is legal. Euthanasia is legal. Gay marriage is legal; in fact, the Netherlands was the first country to make it so. Marijuana is not legal, technically, but from what I hear a lot of folks are red-eyed in Dutch coffee shops, saying puff-puff-pass without looking over their shoulders.

Given the rep, it might surprise school choice critics, who tend to consider themselves left of center, and who tend to view school choice as not, that the Netherlands has one of the most robust systems of government-funded private school choice on the planet. Next year the system will reach the century mark, with nearly 70 percent of Dutch students attending private schools (and usually faith-based schools) on the public dime.

By just about any measure, the Netherlands is a progressive’s paradise. According to the Social Progress Index, it was the ninth most progressive nation in 2015, down from No. 4 in 2014. (The U.S. was No. 16 both years.) On the SPI, it ranked No. 1 in tolerance for homosexuals, and No. 2 in press freedom. On another index, the Netherlands is No. 1 in gender equality. (The U.S. is No. 42.) It’s also among the world leaders in labor union membership (No. 19 in 2012, with 17.7 percent, eight spots ahead of the U.S.). And by some accounts, Amsterdam, the capital, is the most eco-friendly city in Europe.

Somehow, this country that makes Vermont look as red as Alabama is ok with full, equal government funding for public and private schools. It’s been that way been since a constitutional change in 1917. According to education researcher Charles Glenn, the Dutch education system includes government-funded schools that represent 17 different religious types, including Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and Rosicrucian, and hundreds that align to alternative bents like Montessori and Waldorf.

Glenn, an occasional contributor to redefinED, has written the book on the subject. He calls the Netherlands system “distinctively pluralistic.”

The Netherlands’ tradition of pluralism dates back hundreds of years. After the Dutch won their independence in 1609, Amsterdam became the commercial capital of Europe. It served as a hub for trade and finance, a cultural center that produced the likes of Rembrandt, and a refuge for migrants from across the continent, many of whom came fleeing religious persecution.

By the late nineteenth century, however, the country’s diverse religious factions, including Catholics, different Protestant sects, and various secular groups had created their own cultural silos, or “pillars.” Each had its own churches, its own schools, and its own social clubs. Some wanted public schools to be faith-based. Some wanted them to be “neutral.” Some wanted them to reflect one faith more than another.

The 1917 constitutional change was part of a broader reconciliation in Dutch politics called “The Pacification.” It followed decades of strife over schooling. No remedy worked until different factions agreed to let the parents decide, and let the money follow the child.

The system continues to have its tensions and tradeoffs. Some liberals still wonder if “common schools” would be better at unifying a country that grows ever more diverse. The influx of Muslim immigrants gives people pause, even as older divisions between religious factions fade. The Dutch way also includes far more regulation than some choice stalwarts in the U.S. would be comfortable with.

I don’t know enough to have a good opinion. But Glenn does, and he concludes most parents and the general public in the Netherlands are satisfied with their schools. Ed policy expert Mike McShane also points out the Dutch system produces some of the world’s best academic outcomes (Top 10 internationally in math, science and reading), at less cost per-pupil than the U.S. That should count for something.

For my skeptical liberal friends, I’d like to note that even the socialists are on board. Even before the 1917 constitutional change, the Socialist Party in the Netherlands was backing full public funding for private and faith-based schools. Why? Because, according to a resolution it adopted in 1902:

“Social democracy must not interfere with the unity of the working class against believing and nonbelieving capitalists in the social sphere for the sake of theological differences … “

There you have it: Fight the man. Not school choice.

May 4, 2019 4 comments

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Separated and secular

John E. Coons October 31, 2018

John E. Coons

The legendary Jack Coons of Berkeley writes, “One of the primary effects of this exclusion of God is that the school must now present some picture of human happiness and its achievement that fades with death; and that picture must be consistent with a reason for good citizen behavior.”

Three score years ago the U.S. Supreme Court forbade the teaching and symbols of religion in public schools. God is neither to be discussed, pictured nor even sung to at Christmas; maybe at graduations and football games students may express their thanks to God – up to a point.

It is proper, of course, for the teachers to relate the truths of Darwin and his theory of natural selection. But, it is improper to invite the student mind to wonder about just how all that material reality came to be in the first place. Could matter create itself; could all this something come from nothing?

Q: Teacher, would you explain?

A: School doesn’t teach about that; ask your mother.

The social effect of banishing God-talk from the classroom is very difficult to estimate using the statistical lenses of social science. But, with observation and common sense, one can hope broadly to describe the expectations of the justices and, then, the degree of their realization in our time. The court hoped: 1) to clarify that using the public education office to make children aware of our God debates (or, worse, of course, to take sides) occasions an “establishment of religion,” hence is forbidden; and 2) thereby to assure an atmosphere in public school purged of transcendental ideology, assuring offense to none and, instead, making a contribution to social unity.

The court’s first hope appears realized to a considerable degree. Litigation and administrative persuasion have been successful at eliminating many books and teaching materials that suggest the existence of God and his role in human life. There is, I believe, little of the transcendental left lurking in our curricula. The court’s purge has, of course, been greatly assisted by many state constitutions that, since the late 19^th Century, have forbidden nearly all public assistance to religious private schools.

One of the primary effects of this exclusion of God is that the school must now present some picture of human happiness and its achievement that fades with death; and that picture must be consistent with a reason for good citizen behavior. Even without God we have to live together. With eternal salvation as a classroom no-no, the government must present a life-plan and defend it. And so it does. With God out of the picture, each of us is “to find ourselves,” set our own goals and do what’s best for number one. To teach the child otherwise – to recognize and honor an already established human rule and responsibility – would verge upon theology. Of course, the teacher and the system do have rules of conduct for the child, but these must be understood and defended principally as the assurance that everyone, to a point, lets the other fellow do his own thing.

Has secularization worked? I fear not.

October 31, 2018 0 comment

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School choice in flyover country

Ron Matus April 13, 2017

Ron Matus

School choice can’t work in rural areas? Tell that to Judy Welborn (above right) and Michele Winningham, co-founders of a private school in Williston, Fla., that is thriving thanks to school choice scholarships. Students at Williston Central Christian Academy also take online classes through Florida Virtual School and dual enrollment classes at a community college satellite campus.

Levy County is a sprawl of pine and swamp on Florida’s Gulf Coast, 20 miles from Gainesville and 100 from Orlando. It’s bigger than Rhode Island. If it were a state, it and its 40,000 residents would rank No. 40 in population density, tied with Utah.

Visitors are likely to see more logging trucks than Subaru Foresters, and more swallow-tailed kites than stray cats. If they want local flavor, there’s the watermelon festival in Chiefland (pop. 2,245). If they like clams with their linguine, they can thank Cedar Key (pop. 702).

And if they want to find out if there’s a place for school choice way out in the country, they can chat with Ms. Judy and Ms. Michele in Williston (Levy County’s largest city; pop. 2,768).

In 2010, Judith Welborn and Michele Winningham left long careers in public schools to start Williston Central Christian Academy. They were tired of state mandates. They wanted a faith-based atmosphere for learning. Florida’s school choice programs gave them the power to do their own thing – and parents the power to choose it or not.

Williston Central began with 39 students in grades K-6. It now has 85 in K-11. Thirty-one use tax credit scholarships for low-income students. Seventeen use McKay Scholarships for students with disabilities.

“There’s a need for school choice in every community,” said Welborn, who taught in public schools for 39 years, 13 as a principal. “The parents wanted this.”

The little school in the yellow-brick church rebuts a burgeoning narrative – that rural America won’t benefit from, and could even be hurt by, an expansion of private school choice. The two Republican senators who voted against the confirmation of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos – Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine – represent rural states. Their opposition propelled skeptical stories like this, this and this; columns like this; and reports like this. One headline warned: “For rural America, school choice could spell doom.”

A common thread is the notion that school choice can’t succeed in flyover country because there aren’t enough options. But there are thousands of private schools in rural America – and they may offer more promise in expanding choice than other options. A new study from the Brookings Institution finds 92 percent of American families live within 10 miles of a private elementary school, including 69 percent of families in rural areas. That’s more potential options for those families, the report found, than they’d get from expanded access to existing district and charter schools.

In Florida, 30 rural counties (by this definition) host 119 private schools, including 80 that enroll students with tax credit scholarships. (The scholarship is administered by nonprofits like Step Up For Students, which co-hosts this blog.) There are scores of others in remote corners of Florida counties that are considered urban, but have huge swaths of hinterland. First Baptist Christian School in the tomato town of Ruskin, for example, is closer to the phosphate pits of Fort Lonesome than the skyscrapers of Tampa. But all of it’s in Hillsborough County (pop. 1.2 million).

The no-options argument also ignores what’s increasingly possible in a choice-rich state like Florida: choice programs leading to more options.

Before they went solo, Welborn and Winningham put fliers in churches, spread the word on Facebook and met with parents. They wanted to know if parental demand was really there – and it was.

But “one of their top questions was, ‘Are you going to have a scholarship?’ “ Welborn said.

April 13, 2017 0 comment

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Lessons from a school choice trailblazer

Ron Matus June 30, 2016

Ron Matus

Civil rights activist Mary McLeod was a school choice pioneer, opening a private, faith-based school for African-American girls in Daytona in 1904. The state of Florida may honor her with a statue in the U.S. Capitol. (Image from Wikimedia Commons.)

This is the latest in our series on the center-left roots of school choice.

How fitting: The choiciest of school choice states may soon be represented in the U.S. Capitol by the statue of a school choice pioneer.

A state panel nominated three legendary Floridians for the National Statuary Hall last week, but the only unanimous choice was Mary McLeod Bethune. The civil rights activist and adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt is best known for founding the private, faith-based school that became Bethune-Cookman University.

Assuming the Florida Legislature gives the Bethune statue a thumbs up too, more people, including millions of tourists who visit the hall each year, may get to hear her remarkable story. And who knows? Maybe they’ll get a better sense of the threads that tie the fight to educational freedom in Bethune’s era to our own.

With $1.50 to her name, Bethune opened the Daytona Educational and Industrial Training School for Negro Girls in 1904. There were public schools for black students in early 1900s Florida, but they were far inferior to white schools.

Bethune’s vision for something better was shaped by her own educational experience.

She attended three private, faith-based schools as a student. She taught at three private, faith-based schools before building her own. In every case, support for those schools, financial and otherwise, came from private contributions, religious institutions – and the communities they served. Backers were motivated by the noble goal of expanding educational opportunity. Black parents ached for it. That’s why, in the early days of her school, Bethune rode around Daytona on a second-hand bicycle, knocking on doors to solicit donations. That’s why her students mashed sweet potatoes for fund-raiser pies, while Bethune rolled up the crust.

Failure was not an option, because failure would have meant no options.

Goodness knows, I’m no expert on Mary McLeod Bethune. But given what I do know, I think she’d be amazed at the freedom that today’s choice options offer to educators. More and more teachers, especially in choice-friendly states like Florida, are now able to work in or create schools that synch with their vision and values – and get state-supported funding to do it.

June 30, 2016 1 comment

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Sex, drugs and school choice

Ron Matus March 31, 2016

Ron Matus

This is the latest post in our series on the center-left roots of school choice.

Glenn, an occasional contributor to redefinED, has written the book on the subject. He calls the Netherlands system “distinctively pluralistic.”

March 31, 2016 2 comments

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Wishing the school choice menu truly included faith-based schools

Special to redefinED December 30, 2014

Special to redefinED

Garnett

Editor’s note: This is the eighth post in our school choice wish series. See the rest of the line-up here.

by Nicole Stelle Garnett

This year, I wish for education policy that embraces authentic educational pluralism.

In a 1991 speech, Father Andrew Greeley — a renowned sociologist who conducted some of the most important research on the beneficial effects of Catholic schools for disadvantaged kids — lamented that the first school voucher would arrive on the day that the last Catholic school closed. Thankfully, Father Greeley’s predictions about the prospects for parental choice have proven overly pessimistic. Today, 20 states and the District of Columbia have parental choice programs that enable some parents to use public funds to enroll their children in private schools, including faith-based schools.

Father Greeley’s concern about the trajectory of urban Catholic schools was not unfounded. In the last decade alone, nearly 1,500 Catholic schools have closed, mostly in urban communities. These are the very schools that research has demonstrated excel at educating poor minority children. For example, minority students in Catholic schools are 42 percent more likely to graduate from high school, and more than twice as likely to graduate from college than their public school counterparts. Research also strongly suggests that private schools appear to do a better job at preparing students to be engaged members of a diverse, democratic society.

Faith-based schools, however, are more than just educational institutions. They are important community institutions. My own research with Margaret Brinig demonstrates, for example, that Catholic schools promote the development of social capital — the social networks and mutual trust that form the foundation of safe and cohesive communities. This research links Catholic school closures in Chicago and Philadelphia to a breakdown in neighborhood social cohesion that leads to increased neighborhood disorder and even serious crime.

Parental choice is therefore not just good education policy, it is good community development policy. Empowering parents to enroll their children in private and faith-based schools opens the doors of high-quality educational options for children who desperately need them, and also can help stabilize critical community institutions.

The education reform movement has justifiably embraced the expansion of high-quality charter schools, and I celebrate policies that make it possible for low-income students to attend them. But private and faith-based schools, especially but not only urban Catholic schools, have long been, and remain, a critical piece of the education reform puzzle.

December 30, 2014 0 comment