For many public school students, joining an extracurricular club such as crew, chess, or debate, provides them with purpose, builds friendships, and develops discipline. However, when those clubs are faith-based, such as regular Bible studies, they can cause controversy with school officials.
Religious students simply want to live out their faith in a secular school environment, yet administrators have become increasingly wary — or perhaps they are just bigoted — of allowing anything that might make it look like they are violating the “separation of church and state.” This isn’t some hypothetical debate. It’s harming real students.
In New York, freshman student Daniela Barca wanted to start a Christian club at her school, Ketcham High. School officials eventually denied her request after a laborious process of applying, waiting, and negotiating with the school.
First Liberty, a legal organization specializing in First Amendment cases, sent a demand letter to the school district on Dec. 11, rather than a lawsuit, hoping to resolve the case in a more amicable, cost-effective way. Like many schools, Ketcham already boasted multiple extracurricular clubs, such as the Crew Club, Forensics and Debate Society, and Ski Club.
They informed the district their refusal to allow Barca to start a club was indeed a violation of the Equal Access Act of 1984, which prohibits schools from denying religious clubs access to school facilities when access is granted to secular clubs. Thankfully, this time, a simple letter from a legal organization changed the mind of school officials. Just a few days later, the school said they would allow Barca to start her club.
“We are grateful to Wappingers Central School District officials for acting swiftly to ensure that religious students can freely exercise their right to meet together at school,” said Keisha Russell, Counsel for First Liberty Institute, in a statement. “Daniela is thrilled she’ll be allowed to form a club so those who share her faith can express who they are and encourage each other.”
Another Christian club in Montana is fighting the same bigotry and hoping for a similar result.
Officials with Bozeman Public School District and Bozeman High School recently revoked the Fellowship of Christian Athletes’ status as a school-sponsored club, even though it’s been in existence for five years. Shutting it down out of pure anti-Christian bigotry violates the First Amendment and the same Equal Access Act of 1984 that ensured Barca could start a club.
Alliance Defending Freedom, another legal organization specializing in First Amendment law, sent a letter to school officials. In their letter, ADF clarified that the Equal Access Act makes it illegal for the school “to deny equal access or a fair opportunity to, or discriminate against, any students who wish to conduct a meeting within that limited open forum on the basis of the religious, political, philosophical, or other content of the speech at such meetings.” Like Ketcham, Bozeman High School currently has over 30 different clubs on campus, including the Environmental Awareness Club, the Sexuality and Gender Alliance, and the Human Rights Club.
Unfortunately, these kinds of cases showcasing anti-Christian bigotry keep popping up regularly.
There were several cases last year of Christian groups kicked out of college campuses, at least temporarily. Eventually, officials often fail in their quest to keep faith-based groups out of secular school, and, in other cases, litigation looks like it will favor the faith-based groups. Still, it’s deeply disturbing that so many faith-based groups are singled out and targeted in the first place simply for exercising their First Amendment rights. It’s clear these actions are driven by anti-Christian behavior. It’s on all of us to call it out.
Nicole Russell (@russell_nm) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is a journalist who previously worked in Republican politics in Minnesota.
