Chartering a New Course

HOUSES OF WORSHIP
By NATHANIEL POPPER
Wall Street Journal

When the Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy opened four years ago in suburban Minneapolis, the school was a bold experiment and its survival was in question. There was the scramble to attract students that any charter school faces, but Tarek ibn Ziyad had the additional worry of a constitutional challenge, given the school's sponsorship by a nonprofit called Islamic Relief and the curriculum's emphasis on Muslim culture and the Arabic language.


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If the schools face some backlash -- particularly in the Jewish community, which has always been an ardent defender of church-state separation -- precedent suggests that they would likely stand on firm legal ground in court. "Religious Charter Schools," a book that had a timely publication date earlier this summer, argues that while a publicly funded school cannot endorse one religion, the courts have granted schools a wide latitude in accommodating religion.

The book's author, Lawrence Weinberg, says that for many religious parents the most important part of a religious school is what it does not teach, and charter schools are allowed the privilege of excluding Harry Potter books if they offend Christian sensibilities. On the other side of the coin, public schools have always been able to range widely over the culture and history (as opposed to the theology) of any religion.

"Charter schools offer parents an opportunity to create schools that meet their needs," said Mr. Weinberg, "and religious needs are some of the most profound and important needs that people have."

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Are Charter Schools the New Way to Accommodate Religion in Schools?

Blog From the Capital

The number of charter schools with a religious angle is set to greatly expand if current experiments like Florida's Ben Gamla school are successful, according to today's Wall Street Journal opinion by Nathanial Popper suggests that such publicly-funded schools will be an "explosive new trend."

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Universal Faith

New York Times Magazine

Another school year, another round of controversy about religion in public education. This fall, two new yet already divisive publicly financed schools are set to open: the Khalil Gibran International Academy in Brooklyn and the Ben Gamla Charter School in Hollywood, Fla. Both describe themselves as nonsectarian institutions that emphasize a particular language — Arabic and Hebrew, respectively — and both have been criticized on the assumption that they will be organized around the distinctive cultures (and thus religions) associated with those languages. Meanwhile, at the University of Michigan at Dearborn, a small firestorm has erupted over plans to install foot baths in school washrooms to help Muslim students perform the ablutions required for daily prayer.

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Hebrew Charter School Spurs Dispute in Florida

New York Times

HOLLYWOOD, Fla., Aug. 23 — The new public school at 2620 Hollywood Boulevard stands out despite its plain gray facade. Called the Ben Gamla Charter School, it is run by an Orthodox rabbi, serves kosher lunches and concentrates on teaching Hebrew.

About 400 students started classes at Ben Gamla this week amid caustic debate over whether a public school can teach Hebrew without touching Judaism and the unconstitutional side of the church-state divide. The conflict intensified Wednesday, when the Broward County School Board ordered Ben Gamla to suspend Hebrew lessons because its curriculum — the third proposed by the school — referred to a Web site that mentioned religion.

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Fla. charter school stops Hebrew classes

USA Today

MIAMI — A charter school has been ordered to temporarily suspend Hebrew classes while officials try to determine whether teachers are advocating the Jewish faith.

Broward Schools Superintendent James Notter sent a letter to officials at the Ben Gamla Charter School in Hollywood on Wednesday advising them to halt Hebrew classes until the school board could further examine the curriculum.

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Fla. Charter School Fuels Church-State Debate

The Jewish Daily Forward

America’s first Hebrew-English charter school is scheduled to open this month — following widespread public debate over its curriculum.

The Ben Gamla Charter School in Hollywood, Fla., will welcome approximately 430 students, from kindergarten through eighth grade, on August 20. Children at the bilingual school will spend two hours each day learning Hebrew, with words and concepts taught in the context of Jewish culture and history. They will not, however, receive religious instruction.

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ACLU STATEMENT ON CARVER ELEMENTARY SCHOOL'S MUSLIM PRAYERS

Weighing the Fundamental and Competing Constitutional Principles
The following statement can be attributed to Kevin Keenan, Executive Director of the ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties.

A controversy has been mounting at Carver Elementary in San Diego about the role of religion and prayer in public schools � and particularly Islamic prayers. (situation) The situation at Carver raises serious concerns�and not just about what the school is doing. Some people are using the Carver controversy as an excuse to promote their own religious agenda in public schools while others are fanning the flames of prejudice by making wildly inaccurate claims about what is actually going on.

Parents�not governments and not public schools�should decide what religious training children receive. Individuals�not the government�should choose how they exercise the callings of their conscience on matters of belief. That is what our Constitution requires, and it is what is right and best for both religion and government in this country.

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