Source: https://www.freedomforuminstitute.org/first-amendment-center/topics/freedom-of-religion/religious-liberty-in-public-schools/released-time/
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 13:45:54+00:00

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In the 1925 case of Pierce v. Society of Sisters, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states cannot use their compulsory education laws to prevent children from attending private, religious schools, instead of public schools. In the decades since, the Court has gone much further to accommodate students’ religious needs, by ruling that public schools can choose to release students during the school day to receive private religious instruction off campus, if parents consent. However, the Court does not require schools to so release students, and under First Amendment principles of church-state separation, public schools cannot encourage or discourage participation in religious instruction.
The key Supreme Court cases related to religious “released-time” programs areMcCollum v. Board of Education (1948) and Zorach v. Clauson (1952). Technically, McCollum is not about released time, because it struck down an Illinois school board’s policy of allowing religious indoctrination inside public schools during the school day. But the McCollum case established principles that have guided later rulings on how the First Amendment applies to schools.
Four years after McCollum, in the Zorach case, the Supreme Court ruled specifically on the constitutionality of off-campus, release-time programs. The Court upheld them, under certain conditions, by clarifying the earlier McCollumopinion. The Court emphasized the difference between schools actually supporting religious indoctrination and schools merely accommodating children’s religious needs. The Court upheld a New York City policy of allowing children, upon parental request, to leave public schools part of the day for religious studies taught by private groups on private property.
Douglas also wrote, “When the state encourages religious instruction or cooperates with religious authorities by adjusting the schedule of public events to accommodate sectarian needs, it follows the best of our traditions.” In short, church-state separation does not require the state to be “hostile, suspicious, and even unfriendly” to the needs of church members.
The key differences between McCollum and Zorach might be characterized this way: In McCollum, students participated in (1) state-approved religious exercises (2) in school (3) upon parental consent, but in Zorach, students participated in (1) purely private religious exercises (2) off campus (3) upon parental request.
Although, actually, the opinions in McCollum and Zorach both refer to parental wishes as “requests,” the word may be less appropriate in McCollum. McCollumemphasized the compulsory nature of school attendance, and the fact that the state pre-approved and endorsed specific religion teachers for children. Because those were the only allowable religion teachers, individual parents could not so much “request” that their children receive desired instruction as “consent” for their children to receive whatever instruction the state offered. Individual parents could choose only to accept or reject the state-sponsored indoctrination of their children.
Zorach, on the other hand, emphasized accommodating the religious needs of students and parents who had made independent religious choices. Under the Court’s characterization, individual parents freely decided which doctrines and religious teachers they wanted individual children exposed to, and those parents took the initiative to ask the school to accommodate the children’s religious obligations. The schools didn’t approve or endorse the doctrines or teachers, but merely allowed children to voluntarily go hear them. So, in spite of the Court’s language, McCollum arguably dealt with parental consent, whileZorach dealt with true parental requests.
“[P]ublic school accommodation of religious beliefs through a released-time program is a largely passive response to parental assertions of the right to ‘direct the upbringing and education of children,’” according to a federal appellate court in Lanner v. Wimmer (10th Cir. 1981), citing Pierce, andWisconsin v. Yoder (1972).
Under Zorach, states can allow released-time programs when parents and students request them, but most states let individual school districts decide whether to have the programs. If schools choose to allow released time, students from all religious groups must be allowed to participate, without discrimination, in their own groups’ activities. Members of both large and small religions must be treated equally.
Schools should avoid entangling their administration with that of any church program when keeping track of student attendance from released-time programs, according to a federal appeals court in Lanner v. Wimmer (10th Cir. 1981). The court required schools to find the “least entangling” means of preventing truancy, which meant school officials should not have to hunt down attendance slips at religious institutions.
Precedents from school-prayer cases, and from other cases involving church-state relations, strongly suggest that schools should not rent their facilities to religious groups for indoctrination during the school day, and that schools probably cannot give academic credit for released-time programs.
Although in Lanner v. Wimmer the federal appeals court gave reasons why certain other types of credit may be constitutional, other courts might disagree, and Supreme Court precedents are ultimately controlling.

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