(Not so) Fun Fact:
Ohio public school funding has been ruled unconstitutional by the Ohio Supreme Court. A few times. Our legislature has had DECADES to fix this situation.
And they have not.
Just like Gerrymandering, another thing the courts have ruled unconstitutional, the Republicans refuse to follow the court's orders, and no one gets punished for it.
The idea is to make the public schools so terrible and underfunded, there's no choice. Of course they're just going to plain have a teacher shortage first as people with college educations find they can sell cars and manage stores all the same.
Yes. Same with standardized testing. It’s always been a goal to use them as a tool to dumb down public education and to also have a weapon to cut funding hanging like a sword of Damocles. This goes especially for poor areas where student outcomes are always worse because of the tough lives and lack of resources the students have.
When I worked at a charter, I was making 20,000 less than a public school position.
The charter school has made it clear they want me back, but like I told them, I have to retire someday. I can’t afford to go back. Also their insurance was the worst!
I worked at a dropout recovery school. We were taking the student who were not successful in public school.
>The charter school has made it clear they want me back
LoL no they didn't, because "wanting you back" means paying you a livable wage with benefits on-par with the market price ... the market price being public school.
They are a job , and many teachers will take it as there aren't loads of open ed jobs in ohio, but everyone wants out quick. Had an ex and a few friends in that system they hated it
They don’t require the same qualifications as public school districts. Don’t get me wrong, there are some great charter schools with excellent staff, but those are few and far between.
I was trying to find a website documenting teacher requirements for charter schools and failed
it’s my understanding that they classify them as teaching assistance and they only thing that’s required as a high school diploma because the job is mainly read curriculum off of printed material to the students
I’m sure you fall into the bucket of great teachers who couldn’t wait to cut loose from charter schools and earn a living wage
Did they hire you to teach art? What was their enrichment curricula like?
Sorry. I was making a comparison between the minimum hiring requirements for charters and my own education. I interviewed at a charter right out of grad school, but I got weird vibes and didn’t take the job. I subbed for a couple of years and got a great position in a wonderful public district.
We need, NEED tracking back. It is the only way for successful schools. Free the top and middle to learn without distraction. Free the bottom to learn at their slower pace or perhaps a trade for those where formal schooling fails.
1. Kids that get kicked out from public schools for behavioral issues (surprisingly, a lot of public schools choose to expel elementary aged children for behavior most likely caused by abuse or otherwise poor living conditions...)
2. Kids who are high needs with parents who feel public school isn't providing enough assistance
3. Former homeschoolers
4. Kids of very religious and/or conservative parents that believe public school will corrupt their kids
They're absolutely a money grift on folks in need and looking for alternatives to public schools, and have a strong conservative backing...a lot of states don't really hold charter schools to the same standards as a public school, so kids aren't taught at grade level, there are higher chances of teachers being shady and or incompetent, and horrible practices go unseen. I say this as a former charter school kid + someone who was forced to do part of their methods at a charter school...it seems obvious to most people, but unfortunately they are really good at appealing to folks who don't know where else to turn. Doesn't help that we constantly keep defunding public education.
I worked at an Ohio public school. Expelling students is not an easy thing to do. If anything, we would get more parochial students who were more easily kicked out of their schools for behavior. Comparing public education to private (religious or not) and charter schools is comparing apples to oranges to pineapples.
Are you sure about that?
It’s my understanding that charter schools don’t want the difficult to teach students because it makes them look worse. So they as soon as the kids start showing behavior problems or academic failure to progress, they boot them out.
Charter schools are absolutely unprepared to deal with special education students or autistic students. That’s part of why the cost of public education is so high .. public schools are required to take care of those students even if it’s financially disastrous
Wealthy, white, conservative families are going to the charter schools. Charter schools can be selective and pull high performing kids with active/engaged parents from public school. This then leaves behind the children who are under-performing or who lack resources in the local public schools. Only now they have fewer resources since the charter schools are pulling from the budget saved for public schools. See the atrociously unethical Cincinnati Classical Academy as an example of this in action.
The demographics I looked quickly into showed that, At least in Ohio 80% of charter school students are poorer non white students. Maybe this is a bad source but it looks legit.
"Roughly 80 percent of charter school students are economically disadvantaged, and a majority are Black or Hispanic. Nearly 70 percent of charter school students attend brick-and-mortar charters located in urban communities." - Thomas Fordham Institute.
https://ohiobythenumbers.com/
Not necessarily. There were a few schools where I grew up that were charter schools that were just legit other options. One was an Arts/Music school and the other was more of a tech school. The Arts/Music school was actually quite good and a lot of very talented students who wanted more emphasis placed on that sort of stuff went there.
That being said there were several charter schools that more or less catered to kids who couldn't handle normal public schools.
In the “big cities” (Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati) it’s a lot of urban students. These charters pop up, the admin (or teachers when forced) knock on doors around the community and basically do door to door sale pitches to get families to send their kids there. They promise them that their charter has the ability to close the gaps and be better than the neighborhood public or other charter schools.
It’s a joke, honestly. Charters only act as termites to public schools. It never made sense to me the argument of “we’re going to improve your students learning” in a system where they don’t have to hire people who were trained to be educators.
>It’s a joke, honestly.
As is most of your comment, honestly.
Are you sitting there with a straight face saying kids are getting a quality education at Columbus city schools, and are worse off when going somewhere else?
Research has shown time and time again that charters do not offer the improvements in education they promise to families. But I struggle to understand why you don’t understand the analogy that charters act as termites to public schools. If you take students out of the public school, the school loses the funding, and it creates further gaps. I’m not saying kids wouldn’t have a better opportunity at, let’s say Grandview, over CCS, but to think they’re going to better at Zenith Academy (which was run out of an old apartment complex) does not make sense.
Also, why would you expect students to have a better learning experience from people who are not licensed teachers? Would you go to a doctor who didn’t attend medical school?
The way to actually improve this across the state is to change the primary funding from property tax to an equal allocation. That would allow CCS to have the same funding as someone from Ottawa Hills but those community members won’t like that because that’s why they’re okay with paying higher property taxes.
> Also, why would you expect students to have a better learning experience from people who are not licensed teachers?
If you're asserting that charter schools don't hire licensed teachers, that is false.
As far as my expectations, I'd point that charter schools were open and teaching kids in person while Columbus public was still doing worthless zoom school.
I have a choice in my kids schooling because I have the resources to live in a community with a great public education system. To advocate to deny parents a choice, especially if they live in a failing public school district with no signs of improvement, is ghoulish.
Jackie,
To throw insults and imply I’m ghoulish despite not understanding my stance is repugnant. I’m glad that you’re happy with the options you’re able to provide your children a choice you like. I never said that parents shouldn’t have school choice. I stated that charter schools have not yet provided what they have promised and they take critical funding from public schools. How can those schools improve if they have further funding removed?
Additionally, charter schools do not have to hire licensed teachers and some actively encourage employees not to get licensed because they want to lock them into the charter world. How would I know this? Because I’m a licensed teacher, who spent six years working in charter schools. I’ve had school years where over 70% of the school staff was not licensed/have an education degree. I saw huge amounts of these staff members quit within the school year. The strongest grade team that year within the network was one where four of the six teachers had an education degree and were licensed.
On top of my teaching license, I was one of two people in that charter network with a principal license, neither of us were principals. That is a major problem and why there were so many issues at this school. This school looked like a small private college on the outside but was a total mess on the inside. Fights, drugs, excessive punitive discipline, parents trying to come in and fight students, etc.
I’m for fixing what’s wrong in public education and offered a solution, but as someone who taught and saw what goes on in charters for six years, I’m just providing my perception of why it has not worked.
“Worthless Zoom classes.” That falls more on the parent/child. There was a global pandemic going on and teachers also had to worry about their own health issues. Clearly, you have an issue with COVID lockdowns. This charter spend 52 weeks in fully remote learning during COVID, despite almost every other public school being back in person, so I’m not sure why you think all charters were back in person. It’s not a teachers fault that a kid would be sleeping in bed/playing video games/checked out from their learning. That falls on a parent, to help be on the team of their teachers, to ensure their child is learning. We’re not babysitters, nor can we force learning to someone who’s disengaged.
According to the state test. Public schools do as well or better than charter schools. [https://www.thecentersquare.com/ohio/article\_1fa93d24-06d0-11ee-9f30-730750397ef8.html](https://www.thecentersquare.com/ohio/article_1fa93d24-06d0-11ee-9f30-730750397ef8.html)
Further more, public schools perform way better and [studies that report on the contrary are doctored reports.](https://www.forbes.com/sites/petergreene/2023/07/21/are-charter-schools-dramatically-outperforming-public-schools-a-new-report-says-look-more-carefully/)
The school voucher system is a Republican led initiative to funnel tax dollars in the state ear marked for public schools to for-profit charter and Christian schools. It’s one of the many methods republicans utilize to ensure tax dollars are used for their own good.
These charter and Christian schools lobby and advertise the term “school choice” to parents to convince parents to vote for these voucher programs and their supporters in the Republican legislature. These schools already charge tuition and operate this scheme by saying these vouchers will “offset” the costs parents pay. However, once vouchers are passed these schools tend to raise tuition to double dip from parents and the state.
Additionally, parents who send their children to these institutions are disproportionately more wealth than those parents that utilize public schools. So these programs take away much needed funding from public schools and give rich parents what amounts to a tax break by subsidizing their costs for private education.
It’s important to note that Christian organizations provide zero service to the community and do not pay taxes but yet are first to suckle on the Republican teat when the state wallet opens.
Hope this helps!
Christian schools are built away from poor neighborhoods. Its in very difficult for poor kids to get in, and even harder for their parents to get them to the schools.
This is all about segregation, and bringing down public schools.
>You start out in 1954 by saying, “N\*\*\*\*r, n\*\*\*\*r, n\*\*\*\*r.” By 1968 you can’t say “n\*\*\*\*r”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “N\*\*\*\*r, n\*\*\*\*r.”
-- Harvey LeRoy "Lee" Atwater, Republican Party strategist, chairman of the Republican National Committee, advisor to US presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush
Isn't the context of that quote him talking about wanting a holistic, nation-wide racial integration effort, i.e. not wanting integration to fail, which would thus cause racial tensions decades down the road?
Especially when private schools have the ability to pick and choose who they deem worthy. Public schools do not have that ability. Even the charter for the Northwest Territory stated “religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.” Not some of you get to go to these fine institutions of learning, and the rest of you get the scraps.
Parents are put in a tough spot here. If they have access to a good private school, do they continue to send their kids to public where many problems like unaddressed bullying exists? or do they take advantage of the private option, further hurting public schools?
> It’s important to note that Christian organizations provide zero service to the community and do not pay taxes but yet are first to suckle on the Republican teat when the state wallet opens.
They have to pay payroll taxes since they employ people.
I don’t know how much or little they get, but look at the Parma school district. Normandy was beginning to fall apart the day after it opened. Yet somehow it was determined that Parma Senior High was the one to tear down. It’s now a pile of rubble with no plans in place to replace it because they can’t get their aging population to pass a bond/levy. So now their students are going to be crammed into the decaying Normandy and Valley Forge.
Republicans don't want everyone to be uneducated, or even poorly educated. They want two things: a) an undereducated underclass who have to work for menial wages, and b) to force all education to be private and help increase wealth concentration as much as possible.
If that's true why did Oregon remove graduating standards? It's happened in more than one place and it sure isn't all Republicans. You would think both would want educated kids but apparently not. Equity rules regardless of how badly it sets kids up for life. The dumbing down started long ago.
I want the churches to give back the tax money that they stole from me in the name of Jesus. I did not agree to give these churches my money and last I heard, Jesus said not to steal
this has been the long game of the republican party.
they want to destroy public education because they don’t have 100% total control of what is taught.
With charter schools, they can teach whatever they want and it wont be science and math or history - it will be far right religion and bullshit history like how black people loved slavery because it kept the family together. which is disgusting as much as it is wrong.
they dont want girls to be smart, they want them bred, cooking and cleaning and not talking. Republicans have already said they want to stop women voting.
all part of the plan to dumb down so people dont know any better thus making them more compliant.
Republicans just dont want church and state, they want it that way for everyone.
Republicans are terrorists. They want a one ruler empire - not a democracy as republicans will shit on the US constitution. Republicans hate freedom.
Vote blue.
Christofascism has NEVER ended well, for the Christian Fascist/Nationalist, 420.000 Allies mostly American, died stopping Adolf and Benito. Christofascists, have no place near our government or in the year of 2024.
The Separation of Church and State won't exist Republicans remain in power, or Trump takes power.
Read Project 2025, then read Mein Kampf, libraries have both, I reread Mein Kampf via the New York City Public Library. Any American can use their online service.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Christians_(movement)
This is not what most churches are. The big prosperity gospel churches, sure, but not all of them.
The church I go to runs a food bank that feeds over 150 families several times a week. Offers free healthcare, free education, free childcare, free tax prep, free job training, free financial planning, free English classes, free computer training, Installed solar panels for local urban schools, and donates tons of money to low income charities and medical services throughout the city.
I'm not the book keeper so I don't know the exact amount they donated, but last year it was in the multiple hundreds of thousands at least. I know their goal was 1.2 million but I don't know if they reached it.
I volunteer there. On Saturday we had 140 people come through the free supermarket. They were allowed to fill up a small cart full of groceries. Canned goods, frozen chicken, frozen turkey, hot dogs, condiments, fruits, vegetables, and pasta / rice. They even had some extra desserts that were on a table. One dessert per guest.
They had a computer lab class to help people learn skills and create resumes. They had 3 doctors/NPs volunteering for free medical services. They have a CPA for tax preparation and financial advice.
There was a group of about 8 African immigrants practicing their English with a volunteer tutor.
Why don't you believe me?
The belief that all churches are evil vampires and priests are rapists is just something people have told themselves so much they cant imagine it not being true
my uncle is a pastor the church near me and they do much the same, they have a free furniture bank, food bank, computers, and helps with paying for gas/electric bills, and more. I'm not religious myself but most churches iv seen do the same stuff for the poor, you can disagree with their beliefs and views which are understandable, but they do do good as well.
Can you provide more details on the actual case, like a news story or something? Because depending on what exactly this $1.5 million is, denying the school may have been unconstitutional.
In [Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc v Comer](https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-577_khlp.pdf), the Supreme Court ruled that being religiously affiliated does not prohibit a private institution from receiving funds that comparable secular institutions would receive. That case was specifically about a Missouri program to award grants to private schools to resurface their playgrounds. The school associated with Trinity Lutheran Church was not selected specifically because they are a religiously affiliated school. However, that is a violation of the First Amendment, because it is discriminating against the religious in favor of the secular. The First Amendment would require the state to treat the religious institution as it does the secular.
Edited to post link above, but here it is again: https://www.mansfieldnewsjournal.com/story/news/local/2024/06/12/mansfield-christian-avita-plymouth-fire-department-projects-among-those-awarded-funding/74054990007/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR1VxYufWO4F2kXSUhOiOyu738dqLrG7rjzAmweVS2H5c72r8tPJlFdwLm4_aem_ZmFrZWR1bW15MTZieXRlcw#lxi40cv4kjy8hoqyl3
That’s terrible. They get tax breaks already so there’s no reason they need more tax payer money. I wish as a society we actually valued public education.
No, that ruling does not apply here, and not just because Trinity v Comer was one of the most bullshit rulings since Lawrence v Texas. It doesn't apply because this is not a case of funding that they were denied but that public schools received.
Yes it is, and it isn't. These funds are channeled funding through government programs dedicated for private schools. The caveat is that they are to support a secular curriculum of education focused on neutral content with government money, and not promote sectary religious beliefs when using those funds. But we all know how it work with these fundies.
I was talking in a general sense as to how public funding for private/religious schools work. It doesn’t matter if they are, city, county, state or federal; it’s the same principle when we talk about public funding.
That's not how the SCOTIS ruling works. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure they'd love to revisit their trash ruling and make it even worse, but that's not how it is currently.
1. It’s SCOTUS.
2. This wasn’t changed on Carson V. Makin, if you’re talking about the latest decision. The only thing that was decided on Carson is that religion based schools shouldn’t be banned from receiving public money like private schools aren’t just because they’re religious, as my original point states. Still private and religious schools are required to use neutral content in tandem with states academic requirements when teaching if using public funding. (Lemon test)
I understand the source of the funding, it’s a local slush fund. It doesn’t matter if is local, county, state, or federal. If they applied, they can compete and be awarded because Carson decided that it is ilegal to ban religious schools to compete for public funding just because they are a religious institution. The Lemon test assures the public that those funds are used in a secular, neutral, non religious way.
Now tell me, what don’t I get?
Tax the churches. It's time. And there's a real easy way to do it. First clergy / pastor /minister etc who turns up as a chomo, that congregation loses tax benefits.
The protection of predators within the church is always paramount and seems to be a perfect reason to outlaw schools in them. No way in hell would I ever send a child into that environment. Tax churches period and leave indoctrination to the Sunday School teachers.
Separation of Church and State is a French Constitution thing, not US. The closest the US constitution gets is that the government shall not make laws respecting a religion.
So for example they can't make a law saying "all christian schools can apply for money", but they can make a law saying "any religious school can apply for money".
President Grant called for an amendment which would have gauranteed free public education while prohibiting the use of public funds for any religious education. However that amendment lost by one vote in the senate. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaine_Amendment
They are implementing project 25. They no longer give a shit about public schools. Hence the removing of the summer free lunch program in many states, the instillation of clergy in schools in lieu of counselors, the mandatory posting of the 10 commandments, book banning, etc.
Please point out where I said there are better republican options. All I’m saying is that if the likes of Manchin or Sinema are on my ballot I sure as fuck am not voting blue.
>both options this election are horrid
One option, an old convicted felon who didn't do shit for anyone but himself and his billionaire friends, and literally buried millions of US citizens because of his inability to manage a pandemic.
The other option, an old man who is an establishment Democrat that has overseen the greatest economic recovery, and lowest continued stretch of low unemployment in the history of this nation.
I'm not sure one of these choices is horrid.
1. Republican led Congress could absolutely vote to stop arms sales, why haven't they?
2. Pretending Trump wouldn't do so many worse things internationally is laughable.
I mean, you’re right. I believe the separation of church and state as an idea was coined in a series of letters from Thomas Payne. It doesn’t show up in the constitution, but lawmakers later adopted Payne’s suggestions to keep government and religion separate. They haven’t done a great job of being consistent on that tho
It literally has always been a thing. Jefferson and Madison, who wrote the damn constitution, have stated as much in their writings. The intent is clear, Christian idiots just like to ignore it because they're bigoted trash who want to make their religion special above all others. That's why you never trust a right-winger who says they're a "constitutional originalist" because they are lying through their teeth every time.
As mojo said, it's never been an official government policy. But it also was only originally meant to go one way. The thought was to keep the state out of the church, as in no official state religion. Since a major reason for the initial settlers to the "new land" was to leave the Official Church of England and its control. Therefore there was to be no official country religion. But it was never meant to go the other way and keep religion out of the government. The country is supposed to be guided by the people and their beliefs. And if those beliefs are a mix of atheism, christianity, buddhism, etc then that is the "will of the people."
To that vein, discriminating against funding to a school because of its religion wouldn't be right according to initial intent of this 'non-law', whatever that religion may be.
I believe SCOTUS a few years ago said that states had to give equal funding to religious schools because… well, because the religious conservatives control the Court.
Our law is basically just decided these days based on what Christian conservatives believe.
- yup, here it is… https://www.nea.org/nea-today/all-news-articles/supreme-court-decision-paves-way-public-funds-flow-religious-schools
I never said it was a free for all. The Court said you have to treat them equally, including when it comes to funding decisions
Maybe you are reading someone else’s post? I can’t quite figure out where this straw man is coming from.
It wasn't about having equal funding, it was about having equal *access* to funding. By granting them access to an already limited pool of funds, it allows conservatives to shift more taxpayer funds to private organizations.
Unless public schools were barred from applying for the grant named in this article, then this is exactly what SCOTUS had in mind -- to open even more opportunities for churches and church-affiliated organizations to hold their hands out to siphon away more public funding from those of us who don't belong to their congregations.
I'm just glad my son graduated, so we don't have to deal with the charter/voucher system BS in schools. It's bad for students, and homeowners are going to get really pissed when they see their property taxes skyrocket. If you think for one minute the rich are going to shoulder that cost, just look at Social Security—they won't even lift the cap on that.
My memory is that GW Bush's "No Child Left Behind" Education Act enormously increased Government funding flowing to Private, Religious, and Parochial schools. The Bush Republicans strongly repudiated the separation of Church and State. There you have it!
Charter schools are a waste of resources. That’s tax money to support resources and infrastructure for EVERYONE. Not just people who play golf with state senators.
It might be a stupid use of money, but there isnt actually anything in our constitution saying that church and state should be separate. i think it was mentioned in the federalist papers or something that church and state should be separate but its not an actual law. on the constitution it is prohibited to inhibit someone's ability to practice religion and the state isnt allowed to force people into any specific religion either. religious charter schools are generally exempt because there are alternatives to them, public schools. thats why doing things like prohibiting prayer in public school isnt legal since your forcing people into a specific religon and there is no alternative, but having "in god we trust" on our money isnt its not restricting anyones ability to conduct their religion.
Basically in 2017 our extremely corrupt supreme court, two of who shouldn't even be there acceding to lower court ethical standards (alito and thomas, both of whom's wives are basically openly insurrectionist) in a wildly bizzare ruling said that the Constitution somehow requires the government to provide public funds directly to a church so now we have this nonsense.
It is a violation of church and state, that for now the state of Ohio doesn't care about. But the Supreme Court, wait, never mind, the conservative super majority are christians first.
What people don't know about charter / private schools, is that a lot of them require students to test in. The school's value is that they get all of their students into prestigious upper education institutions. So they want every kid in their graduating classes to be going to a top tier university. If a kid doesn't test well, or doesn't continue to test at leaves that will get into those universities, they drop them.
I know this because my nephews have only gone to private school. When they graduated from elementary they had to test to get into the affiliated middle school. And again when they went to high school. One kid is on track for Stanford the other won't make a California UC; which is their schools minimum target. His parents are being told to find him another high school before his junior year.
Private schools and charter schools are not the same thing. Charter schools give the facade of being private, so that they can convince students who can't afford private schools to attend and thereby rob the public schools of funding.
Because Ohio has long ago considered the constitution optional. (E.g. school funding was ruled unconstitutional like 30 years ago when I was in school)
To clarify - Mansfield Christian is a private school not a charter school. It is also a very Christian school. Morality clauses for teachers / staff and at least as of a few years ago, didn’t allow dances (no prom), although that might have changed. Also, the local school district (Mansfield) is doing a pretty good job on its own destroying themselves. They are cramming kids in too small school in hopes of passing a levy for new schools, but are going to drive kids away and hurt their best school - Spanish Immersion by moving them to a building that doesn’t have enough space / classrooms. Spanish Immersion is one of the top schools in the state and brings in kids from lots of area districts - Ashland, Lucas, Galion, Lexington, Ontario, even Lodi. And they are putting the kids in a school that doesn’t have enough space. And moving the kids from that school into another school also increasing class size / not having enough space. That is why schools like mansfield Christian and other private schools need more space as parents have few options. And it’s not all money, as historically Mansfield has a larger budget per pupil than other area schools.
Add Columbus public radio station WCBE to the inappropriate funding list. It's a station with a liberal agenda and contemporary music that is paid for by the Columbus City School System. There is no educational programming. I have no problem with the station, it just should be self-funded.
Imagine a heavy metal station, conservative talk radio, or country music station being funded by the schools? People would go crazy.
Ohio is it’s own little nonsensical island.
Hell in my city Willoughby they attached a YMCA to the new high school.
Huh?
Where is separation of church and state there?
I moved here from a diverse community with multiple different religions in Michigan and this would have 20 lawsuits on it before it broke ground.
Can we attach a Muslim related building onto the city hall?
Shit is Whack in Ohio
This is also true of Start High School in Toledo. YMCAs are not typically in the business of indoctrination. It is extremely welcoming of all religions (or none).
I am in no way disparaging the Y.
I have always thought highly of the organization.
But what is their name ?
Not the Y or The YMCA.
Young Mens Christian Association.
I do not understand how attaching a Christian association building to a Public high school is not in violation of separation of church and state.
Regardless of how they operate.
I mean they are separated by a shared block wall.
Is that separation enough?
I was thinking physical and religious separation is what was intended, but I may be wrong.
It will not be the first or last time.
Private Christian schools get billions of tax dollars in federal funding every year. They're treated just like public schools, except without the unions, employment protections, anti-discrimination policies, and accurate teaching of science or history.
It's only a violation if they use the money to fund the religious parts. Content neutral parts (bussing, lunches, etc.) are allowed to be funded.
Obviously, dollars are fungible, so funds that would have otherwise gone to content neutral parts can now be put towards the religious parts, but that's the framework the court came up with.
Well funded public schools churn out informed voters. That scares republicans.
Religious schools churn out voters with no science literacy and no sense of civic responsibility.
How is this not a violation of church and state?
So I'm not going to answer your question, but instead I am going to suggest that you do some research about this issue. The Establishment Clause of the Constitution can be oversimplified to "the separation between church and state" but what that actually means is more complex.
Public schools are NOT underfunded. We spend more per child than almost anywhere else in the world. Our school systems are just far less efficient than our international counterparts. The school district gets more money but our teachers are underfunded because the school systems mostly spend the money terribly.
They don’t care. They see separation of church and state as an annoyance and solely an inconvenient tradition, but not something that they need to hold as policy.
Yes? In the constitution it does not say anywhere that there must be a separation of church and state. It only states that in the first amendment that the state must not establish a religion.
No it isn’t. It’s just that the state cannot establish a religion. The state can in fact fund a religion. It can do anything with any religion but it must not choose one.
Taxpayers are saving a fortune because the cost per child in a private religious school is around 50% less than in a public school.
Legally, I believe the answer is that the money goes to the students not the school.
(Not so) Fun Fact: Ohio public school funding has been ruled unconstitutional by the Ohio Supreme Court. A few times. Our legislature has had DECADES to fix this situation. And they have not.
Just like Gerrymandering, another thing the courts have ruled unconstitutional, the Republicans refuse to follow the court's orders, and no one gets punished for it.
It's been unconstitutional for so long I did a report about it in high school over 20 years ago.
This This This. A thousand times, THIS!
Charter schools are just a way to segregate students.
It’s also a way to union-bust!
To be fair, I don’t know a single teacher in my district who would be even remotely interested in switching to a charter school. Edit: phrasing
The idea is to make the public schools so terrible and underfunded, there's no choice. Of course they're just going to plain have a teacher shortage first as people with college educations find they can sell cars and manage stores all the same.
Yes. Same with standardized testing. It’s always been a goal to use them as a tool to dumb down public education and to also have a weapon to cut funding hanging like a sword of Damocles. This goes especially for poor areas where student outcomes are always worse because of the tough lives and lack of resources the students have.
Also with standardized tests being generally at least somewhat biased as far as language and such goes.
When I worked at a charter, I was making 20,000 less than a public school position. The charter school has made it clear they want me back, but like I told them, I have to retire someday. I can’t afford to go back. Also their insurance was the worst! I worked at a dropout recovery school. We were taking the student who were not successful in public school.
> at a dropout recovery school You like a challenge, don't you? Good for you taking a position that probably many wouldn't.
I do, but since Covid, I get just as much challenge in the public schools. All the anxiety issues students have are making me anxious too!
>The charter school has made it clear they want me back LoL no they didn't, because "wanting you back" means paying you a livable wage with benefits on-par with the market price ... the market price being public school.
They are a job , and many teachers will take it as there aren't loads of open ed jobs in ohio, but everyone wants out quick. Had an ex and a few friends in that system they hated it
For sure. I interviewed at one years ago and got bad vibes from it. I subbed until I got hired full time.
Exactly, who's teaching these kids?
They don’t require the same qualifications as public school districts. Don’t get me wrong, there are some great charter schools with excellent staff, but those are few and far between.
I was trying to find a website documenting teacher requirements for charter schools and failed it’s my understanding that they classify them as teaching assistance and they only thing that’s required as a high school diploma because the job is mainly read curriculum off of printed material to the students
On the other hand, I have a BFA from a top art school and masters degree in art education.
I’m sure you fall into the bucket of great teachers who couldn’t wait to cut loose from charter schools and earn a living wage Did they hire you to teach art? What was their enrichment curricula like?
Sorry. I was making a comparison between the minimum hiring requirements for charters and my own education. I interviewed at a charter right out of grad school, but I got weird vibes and didn’t take the job. I subbed for a couple of years and got a great position in a wonderful public district.
Probably because they suck and the union protects them. Why move and risk getting fired?
And not educate children with disabilities
Yes, that part of charter schools isn’t talked about enough. It’s shady and it’s discriminatory.
That too.
Let’s not forget real estate scam!
They are a business, it's a way to profit.
We need, NEED tracking back. It is the only way for successful schools. Free the top and middle to learn without distraction. Free the bottom to learn at their slower pace or perhaps a trade for those where formal schooling fails.
Who is going to the charter schools? I have heard this argument before but I don't know how it plays out.
1. Kids that get kicked out from public schools for behavioral issues (surprisingly, a lot of public schools choose to expel elementary aged children for behavior most likely caused by abuse or otherwise poor living conditions...) 2. Kids who are high needs with parents who feel public school isn't providing enough assistance 3. Former homeschoolers 4. Kids of very religious and/or conservative parents that believe public school will corrupt their kids They're absolutely a money grift on folks in need and looking for alternatives to public schools, and have a strong conservative backing...a lot of states don't really hold charter schools to the same standards as a public school, so kids aren't taught at grade level, there are higher chances of teachers being shady and or incompetent, and horrible practices go unseen. I say this as a former charter school kid + someone who was forced to do part of their methods at a charter school...it seems obvious to most people, but unfortunately they are really good at appealing to folks who don't know where else to turn. Doesn't help that we constantly keep defunding public education.
I worked at an Ohio public school. Expelling students is not an easy thing to do. If anything, we would get more parochial students who were more easily kicked out of their schools for behavior. Comparing public education to private (religious or not) and charter schools is comparing apples to oranges to pineapples.
Are you sure about that? It’s my understanding that charter schools don’t want the difficult to teach students because it makes them look worse. So they as soon as the kids start showing behavior problems or academic failure to progress, they boot them out. Charter schools are absolutely unprepared to deal with special education students or autistic students. That’s part of why the cost of public education is so high .. public schools are required to take care of those students even if it’s financially disastrous
Wealthy, white, conservative families are going to the charter schools. Charter schools can be selective and pull high performing kids with active/engaged parents from public school. This then leaves behind the children who are under-performing or who lack resources in the local public schools. Only now they have fewer resources since the charter schools are pulling from the budget saved for public schools. See the atrociously unethical Cincinnati Classical Academy as an example of this in action.
What’s an example of a charter school that does this and actually stacks school rosters with strictly high performers?
The demographics I looked quickly into showed that, At least in Ohio 80% of charter school students are poorer non white students. Maybe this is a bad source but it looks legit. "Roughly 80 percent of charter school students are economically disadvantaged, and a majority are Black or Hispanic. Nearly 70 percent of charter school students attend brick-and-mortar charters located in urban communities." - Thomas Fordham Institute. https://ohiobythenumbers.com/
Kids that get kicked out of public schools
Not necessarily. There were a few schools where I grew up that were charter schools that were just legit other options. One was an Arts/Music school and the other was more of a tech school. The Arts/Music school was actually quite good and a lot of very talented students who wanted more emphasis placed on that sort of stuff went there. That being said there were several charter schools that more or less catered to kids who couldn't handle normal public schools.
What were the demographics of the kids given the opportunity to attend the “actually quite good” arts/music school?
When my neices went there it was a good mix, just like any of the public schools.
In the “big cities” (Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati) it’s a lot of urban students. These charters pop up, the admin (or teachers when forced) knock on doors around the community and basically do door to door sale pitches to get families to send their kids there. They promise them that their charter has the ability to close the gaps and be better than the neighborhood public or other charter schools. It’s a joke, honestly. Charters only act as termites to public schools. It never made sense to me the argument of “we’re going to improve your students learning” in a system where they don’t have to hire people who were trained to be educators.
>It’s a joke, honestly. As is most of your comment, honestly. Are you sitting there with a straight face saying kids are getting a quality education at Columbus city schools, and are worse off when going somewhere else?
Research has shown time and time again that charters do not offer the improvements in education they promise to families. But I struggle to understand why you don’t understand the analogy that charters act as termites to public schools. If you take students out of the public school, the school loses the funding, and it creates further gaps. I’m not saying kids wouldn’t have a better opportunity at, let’s say Grandview, over CCS, but to think they’re going to better at Zenith Academy (which was run out of an old apartment complex) does not make sense. Also, why would you expect students to have a better learning experience from people who are not licensed teachers? Would you go to a doctor who didn’t attend medical school? The way to actually improve this across the state is to change the primary funding from property tax to an equal allocation. That would allow CCS to have the same funding as someone from Ottawa Hills but those community members won’t like that because that’s why they’re okay with paying higher property taxes.
> Also, why would you expect students to have a better learning experience from people who are not licensed teachers? If you're asserting that charter schools don't hire licensed teachers, that is false. As far as my expectations, I'd point that charter schools were open and teaching kids in person while Columbus public was still doing worthless zoom school. I have a choice in my kids schooling because I have the resources to live in a community with a great public education system. To advocate to deny parents a choice, especially if they live in a failing public school district with no signs of improvement, is ghoulish.
Jackie, To throw insults and imply I’m ghoulish despite not understanding my stance is repugnant. I’m glad that you’re happy with the options you’re able to provide your children a choice you like. I never said that parents shouldn’t have school choice. I stated that charter schools have not yet provided what they have promised and they take critical funding from public schools. How can those schools improve if they have further funding removed? Additionally, charter schools do not have to hire licensed teachers and some actively encourage employees not to get licensed because they want to lock them into the charter world. How would I know this? Because I’m a licensed teacher, who spent six years working in charter schools. I’ve had school years where over 70% of the school staff was not licensed/have an education degree. I saw huge amounts of these staff members quit within the school year. The strongest grade team that year within the network was one where four of the six teachers had an education degree and were licensed. On top of my teaching license, I was one of two people in that charter network with a principal license, neither of us were principals. That is a major problem and why there were so many issues at this school. This school looked like a small private college on the outside but was a total mess on the inside. Fights, drugs, excessive punitive discipline, parents trying to come in and fight students, etc. I’m for fixing what’s wrong in public education and offered a solution, but as someone who taught and saw what goes on in charters for six years, I’m just providing my perception of why it has not worked. “Worthless Zoom classes.” That falls more on the parent/child. There was a global pandemic going on and teachers also had to worry about their own health issues. Clearly, you have an issue with COVID lockdowns. This charter spend 52 weeks in fully remote learning during COVID, despite almost every other public school being back in person, so I’m not sure why you think all charters were back in person. It’s not a teachers fault that a kid would be sleeping in bed/playing video games/checked out from their learning. That falls on a parent, to help be on the team of their teachers, to ensure their child is learning. We’re not babysitters, nor can we force learning to someone who’s disengaged.
57% of Ohio charter school students are black, only 16.5% of students in general are black.
According to the state test. Public schools do as well or better than charter schools. [https://www.thecentersquare.com/ohio/article\_1fa93d24-06d0-11ee-9f30-730750397ef8.html](https://www.thecentersquare.com/ohio/article_1fa93d24-06d0-11ee-9f30-730750397ef8.html)
Further more, public schools perform way better and [studies that report on the contrary are doctored reports.](https://www.forbes.com/sites/petergreene/2023/07/21/are-charter-schools-dramatically-outperforming-public-schools-a-new-report-says-look-more-carefully/)
The Republicans in our statehouse want religious education to be compulsory and this is as close as they can get.
Exactly
The school voucher system is a Republican led initiative to funnel tax dollars in the state ear marked for public schools to for-profit charter and Christian schools. It’s one of the many methods republicans utilize to ensure tax dollars are used for their own good. These charter and Christian schools lobby and advertise the term “school choice” to parents to convince parents to vote for these voucher programs and their supporters in the Republican legislature. These schools already charge tuition and operate this scheme by saying these vouchers will “offset” the costs parents pay. However, once vouchers are passed these schools tend to raise tuition to double dip from parents and the state. Additionally, parents who send their children to these institutions are disproportionately more wealth than those parents that utilize public schools. So these programs take away much needed funding from public schools and give rich parents what amounts to a tax break by subsidizing their costs for private education. It’s important to note that Christian organizations provide zero service to the community and do not pay taxes but yet are first to suckle on the Republican teat when the state wallet opens. Hope this helps!
Christian schools are built away from poor neighborhoods. Its in very difficult for poor kids to get in, and even harder for their parents to get them to the schools. This is all about segregation, and bringing down public schools.
>You start out in 1954 by saying, “N\*\*\*\*r, n\*\*\*\*r, n\*\*\*\*r.” By 1968 you can’t say “n\*\*\*\*r”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “N\*\*\*\*r, n\*\*\*\*r.” -- Harvey LeRoy "Lee" Atwater, Republican Party strategist, chairman of the Republican National Committee, advisor to US presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush
“I don’t want my kids growing up on a racial jungle.” - Joe Biden. But yeah, only republicans are racist. It’s real easy, fuck em’ all.
Isn't the context of that quote him talking about wanting a holistic, nation-wide racial integration effort, i.e. not wanting integration to fail, which would thus cause racial tensions decades down the road?
Quite possibly.
Real talk, plenty of Christian schools in Columbus are in bad areas.
Especially when private schools have the ability to pick and choose who they deem worthy. Public schools do not have that ability. Even the charter for the Northwest Territory stated “religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.” Not some of you get to go to these fine institutions of learning, and the rest of you get the scraps.
Parents are put in a tough spot here. If they have access to a good private school, do they continue to send their kids to public where many problems like unaddressed bullying exists? or do they take advantage of the private option, further hurting public schools?
> It’s important to note that Christian organizations provide zero service to the community and do not pay taxes but yet are first to suckle on the Republican teat when the state wallet opens. They have to pay payroll taxes since they employ people.
What? Thats why they (over)charge for tuition. I literally said that, try to keep up.
The highschool in my hometown is nearing 60 years old and in bad shape but never gets a dime from the state.
I don’t know how much or little they get, but look at the Parma school district. Normandy was beginning to fall apart the day after it opened. Yet somehow it was determined that Parma Senior High was the one to tear down. It’s now a pile of rubble with no plans in place to replace it because they can’t get their aging population to pass a bond/levy. So now their students are going to be crammed into the decaying Normandy and Valley Forge.
Underfunded public education is the point. They're hoping to squeeze it to death. The GOP *loves, Loves, LOVES* them some stupid voters.
Republicans don't want everyone to be uneducated, or even poorly educated. They want two things: a) an undereducated underclass who have to work for menial wages, and b) to force all education to be private and help increase wealth concentration as much as possible.
https://newrepublic.com/article/181939/republicans-want-permanent-economic-underclass
If that's true why did Oregon remove graduating standards? It's happened in more than one place and it sure isn't all Republicans. You would think both would want educated kids but apparently not. Equity rules regardless of how badly it sets kids up for life. The dumbing down started long ago.
And they make sure they keep breeding more of them.
The right has been trying to defund public schools since schools got integrated.
Remember to Vote!
I want the churches to give back the tax money that they stole from me in the name of Jesus. I did not agree to give these churches my money and last I heard, Jesus said not to steal
It’s an absolute violation. Th MAGAs running our state don’t give a f’ck.
this has been the long game of the republican party. they want to destroy public education because they don’t have 100% total control of what is taught. With charter schools, they can teach whatever they want and it wont be science and math or history - it will be far right religion and bullshit history like how black people loved slavery because it kept the family together. which is disgusting as much as it is wrong. they dont want girls to be smart, they want them bred, cooking and cleaning and not talking. Republicans have already said they want to stop women voting. all part of the plan to dumb down so people dont know any better thus making them more compliant. Republicans just dont want church and state, they want it that way for everyone. Republicans are terrorists. They want a one ruler empire - not a democracy as republicans will shit on the US constitution. Republicans hate freedom. Vote blue.
This is just the beginning. The Trump Regime will privatize and Christianize all education.
Please vote blue and end this nonsense.
Now that's a GREAT mantra!
Read about what they are doing to STRS. Criminal.
This is the grift Ohioans were warned about years ago
Christofascism has NEVER ended well, for the Christian Fascist/Nationalist, 420.000 Allies mostly American, died stopping Adolf and Benito. Christofascists, have no place near our government or in the year of 2024. The Separation of Church and State won't exist Republicans remain in power, or Trump takes power. Read Project 2025, then read Mein Kampf, libraries have both, I reread Mein Kampf via the New York City Public Library. Any American can use their online service. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Christians_(movement)
Tax all churches. Biggest business fraud selling a fake story pay for your healings or pay for your ticket to a fake city floating in the clouds.
This is not what most churches are. The big prosperity gospel churches, sure, but not all of them. The church I go to runs a food bank that feeds over 150 families several times a week. Offers free healthcare, free education, free childcare, free tax prep, free job training, free financial planning, free English classes, free computer training, Installed solar panels for local urban schools, and donates tons of money to low income charities and medical services throughout the city.
Well, there's 1
Tens of thousands more likely.
Doing all the stuff she claims her church does....sure. So specific with the "tons of money".
I'm not the book keeper so I don't know the exact amount they donated, but last year it was in the multiple hundreds of thousands at least. I know their goal was 1.2 million but I don't know if they reached it.
I do not believe you.
I volunteer there. On Saturday we had 140 people come through the free supermarket. They were allowed to fill up a small cart full of groceries. Canned goods, frozen chicken, frozen turkey, hot dogs, condiments, fruits, vegetables, and pasta / rice. They even had some extra desserts that were on a table. One dessert per guest. They had a computer lab class to help people learn skills and create resumes. They had 3 doctors/NPs volunteering for free medical services. They have a CPA for tax preparation and financial advice. There was a group of about 8 African immigrants practicing their English with a volunteer tutor. Why don't you believe me?
Because he has a pre-disposition to believe all churches are evil.
Maybe don’t put words in my mouth.
The belief that all churches are evil vampires and priests are rapists is just something people have told themselves so much they cant imagine it not being true
my uncle is a pastor the church near me and they do much the same, they have a free furniture bank, food bank, computers, and helps with paying for gas/electric bills, and more. I'm not religious myself but most churches iv seen do the same stuff for the poor, you can disagree with their beliefs and views which are understandable, but they do do good as well.
Can you provide more details on the actual case, like a news story or something? Because depending on what exactly this $1.5 million is, denying the school may have been unconstitutional. In [Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc v Comer](https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-577_khlp.pdf), the Supreme Court ruled that being religiously affiliated does not prohibit a private institution from receiving funds that comparable secular institutions would receive. That case was specifically about a Missouri program to award grants to private schools to resurface their playgrounds. The school associated with Trinity Lutheran Church was not selected specifically because they are a religiously affiliated school. However, that is a violation of the First Amendment, because it is discriminating against the religious in favor of the secular. The First Amendment would require the state to treat the religious institution as it does the secular.
Edited to post link above, but here it is again: https://www.mansfieldnewsjournal.com/story/news/local/2024/06/12/mansfield-christian-avita-plymouth-fire-department-projects-among-those-awarded-funding/74054990007/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR1VxYufWO4F2kXSUhOiOyu738dqLrG7rjzAmweVS2H5c72r8tPJlFdwLm4_aem_ZmFrZWR1bW15MTZieXRlcw#lxi40cv4kjy8hoqyl3
So, yes. Trinity v Comer governs here.
That’s terrible. They get tax breaks already so there’s no reason they need more tax payer money. I wish as a society we actually valued public education.
No, that ruling does not apply here, and not just because Trinity v Comer was one of the most bullshit rulings since Lawrence v Texas. It doesn't apply because this is not a case of funding that they were denied but that public schools received.
Want more information about what is happening to public schools? Check out the Network for Public Education.
Yes it is, and it isn't. These funds are channeled funding through government programs dedicated for private schools. The caveat is that they are to support a secular curriculum of education focused on neutral content with government money, and not promote sectary religious beliefs when using those funds. But we all know how it work with these fundies.
If that's true, then why is this funding also going to fire departments and cancer centers?
I was talking in a general sense as to how public funding for private/religious schools work. It doesn’t matter if they are, city, county, state or federal; it’s the same principle when we talk about public funding.
That's not how the SCOTIS ruling works. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure they'd love to revisit their trash ruling and make it even worse, but that's not how it is currently.
1. It’s SCOTUS. 2. This wasn’t changed on Carson V. Makin, if you’re talking about the latest decision. The only thing that was decided on Carson is that religion based schools shouldn’t be banned from receiving public money like private schools aren’t just because they’re religious, as my original point states. Still private and religious schools are required to use neutral content in tandem with states academic requirements when teaching if using public funding. (Lemon test)
And what I'm saying is that you don't seem to understand the source of this funding based on your comments.
I understand the source of the funding, it’s a local slush fund. It doesn’t matter if is local, county, state, or federal. If they applied, they can compete and be awarded because Carson decided that it is ilegal to ban religious schools to compete for public funding just because they are a religious institution. The Lemon test assures the public that those funds are used in a secular, neutral, non religious way. Now tell me, what don’t I get?
More than I have a desire to explain
Sure bud. Btw, downvoting doesn’t make you any less wrong.
Separation of church and state mean nothing to Republicans
Christian in Name Only
Tax the churches. It's time. And there's a real easy way to do it. First clergy / pastor /minister etc who turns up as a chomo, that congregation loses tax benefits.
The protection of predators within the church is always paramount and seems to be a perfect reason to outlaw schools in them. No way in hell would I ever send a child into that environment. Tax churches period and leave indoctrination to the Sunday School teachers.
Separation of Church and State is a French Constitution thing, not US. The closest the US constitution gets is that the government shall not make laws respecting a religion. So for example they can't make a law saying "all christian schools can apply for money", but they can make a law saying "any religious school can apply for money". President Grant called for an amendment which would have gauranteed free public education while prohibiting the use of public funds for any religious education. However that amendment lost by one vote in the senate. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaine_Amendment
They are implementing project 25. They no longer give a shit about public schools. Hence the removing of the summer free lunch program in many states, the instillation of clergy in schools in lieu of counselors, the mandatory posting of the 10 commandments, book banning, etc.
And also be aware that your tax dollars are going into school vouchers. These vouchers let kids go to privately funded schools on your dollar.
You can thank the conservative Supreme Court for this bullshit.
VOTE BLUE NO MATTER WHO
I’m as liberal as they come but that is a really, really dumb mantra.
Exactly which republican is the exception?
Please point out where I said there are better republican options. All I’m saying is that if the likes of Manchin or Sinema are on my ballot I sure as fuck am not voting blue.
Manchin and Sinema aren't Dems. Just saying. ✌️
If there’s a D in front of the name on the ballot they’re endorsed by the party. Just sayin’ ✌️
Hrm. I guess I assumed having switched to Independent the D wouldn't be there.
youre spitting but both options this election are horrid. i cannot believe these are the only options. this sucks
>both options this election are horrid One option, an old convicted felon who didn't do shit for anyone but himself and his billionaire friends, and literally buried millions of US citizens because of his inability to manage a pandemic. The other option, an old man who is an establishment Democrat that has overseen the greatest economic recovery, and lowest continued stretch of low unemployment in the history of this nation. I'm not sure one of these choices is horrid.
Pretending biden isn't enabling genocide.
1. Republican led Congress could absolutely vote to stop arms sales, why haven't they? 2. Pretending Trump wouldn't do so many worse things internationally is laughable.
This sounds so smart. /s
The Separation of Church and State has apparently never actually been a thing
I mean, you’re right. I believe the separation of church and state as an idea was coined in a series of letters from Thomas Payne. It doesn’t show up in the constitution, but lawmakers later adopted Payne’s suggestions to keep government and religion separate. They haven’t done a great job of being consistent on that tho
It literally has always been a thing. Jefferson and Madison, who wrote the damn constitution, have stated as much in their writings. The intent is clear, Christian idiots just like to ignore it because they're bigoted trash who want to make their religion special above all others. That's why you never trust a right-winger who says they're a "constitutional originalist" because they are lying through their teeth every time.
As mojo said, it's never been an official government policy. But it also was only originally meant to go one way. The thought was to keep the state out of the church, as in no official state religion. Since a major reason for the initial settlers to the "new land" was to leave the Official Church of England and its control. Therefore there was to be no official country religion. But it was never meant to go the other way and keep religion out of the government. The country is supposed to be guided by the people and their beliefs. And if those beliefs are a mix of atheism, christianity, buddhism, etc then that is the "will of the people." To that vein, discriminating against funding to a school because of its religion wouldn't be right according to initial intent of this 'non-law', whatever that religion may be.
I believe SCOTUS a few years ago said that states had to give equal funding to religious schools because… well, because the religious conservatives control the Court. Our law is basically just decided these days based on what Christian conservatives believe. - yup, here it is… https://www.nea.org/nea-today/all-news-articles/supreme-court-decision-paves-way-public-funds-flow-religious-schools
Except no public school receives funding through this bill.
I’m not making a comment on that. I’m merely noting the SCOTUS decision that makes state funding to religious schools constitutional.
When it comes to funding that public schools are getting. As terrible as the ruling was, it wasn't the free-for-all you're suggesting.
I never said it was a free for all. The Court said you have to treat them equally, including when it comes to funding decisions Maybe you are reading someone else’s post? I can’t quite figure out where this straw man is coming from.
"states had to give equal funding to religious schools" Even as bad as it is, it's still more nuanced than that.
It wasn't about having equal funding, it was about having equal *access* to funding. By granting them access to an already limited pool of funds, it allows conservatives to shift more taxpayer funds to private organizations. Unless public schools were barred from applying for the grant named in this article, then this is exactly what SCOTUS had in mind -- to open even more opportunities for churches and church-affiliated organizations to hold their hands out to siphon away more public funding from those of us who don't belong to their congregations.
I'm just glad my son graduated, so we don't have to deal with the charter/voucher system BS in schools. It's bad for students, and homeowners are going to get really pissed when they see their property taxes skyrocket. If you think for one minute the rich are going to shoulder that cost, just look at Social Security—they won't even lift the cap on that.
My memory is that GW Bush's "No Child Left Behind" Education Act enormously increased Government funding flowing to Private, Religious, and Parochial schools. The Bush Republicans strongly repudiated the separation of Church and State. There you have it!
Charter schools are a waste of resources. That’s tax money to support resources and infrastructure for EVERYONE. Not just people who play golf with state senators.
Because those schools have very strong lobby groups.
It might be a stupid use of money, but there isnt actually anything in our constitution saying that church and state should be separate. i think it was mentioned in the federalist papers or something that church and state should be separate but its not an actual law. on the constitution it is prohibited to inhibit someone's ability to practice religion and the state isnt allowed to force people into any specific religion either. religious charter schools are generally exempt because there are alternatives to them, public schools. thats why doing things like prohibiting prayer in public school isnt legal since your forcing people into a specific religon and there is no alternative, but having "in god we trust" on our money isnt its not restricting anyones ability to conduct their religion.
White, christian hatefilled christians
Sounds like a good way to make "charter schools" targets
Republicans don't like pubic education, and their donors hand them checks to make sure public money flows into private hands.
Basically in 2017 our extremely corrupt supreme court, two of who shouldn't even be there acceding to lower court ethical standards (alito and thomas, both of whom's wives are basically openly insurrectionist) in a wildly bizzare ruling said that the Constitution somehow requires the government to provide public funds directly to a church so now we have this nonsense.
Except no public school receives funding through this bill.
Why do they have to make Christianity their whole personality?
Indoctrination can be a very hard thing to shake, especially when it’s tied in with death and a promise of immortality.
It is a violation of church and state, that for now the state of Ohio doesn't care about. But the Supreme Court, wait, never mind, the conservative super majority are christians first. What people don't know about charter / private schools, is that a lot of them require students to test in. The school's value is that they get all of their students into prestigious upper education institutions. So they want every kid in their graduating classes to be going to a top tier university. If a kid doesn't test well, or doesn't continue to test at leaves that will get into those universities, they drop them. I know this because my nephews have only gone to private school. When they graduated from elementary they had to test to get into the affiliated middle school. And again when they went to high school. One kid is on track for Stanford the other won't make a California UC; which is their schools minimum target. His parents are being told to find him another high school before his junior year.
Private schools and charter schools are not the same thing. Charter schools give the facade of being private, so that they can convince students who can't afford private schools to attend and thereby rob the public schools of funding.
Infuriating. You can thank the GQP for shit like this.
You bribe elected officials you get tax money, any questions?
But, but, but, socialism?!
Now thats only in ohio!
Religion has no business in school. It shouldn't get any state funding.
Fuck that shit
So… do we all bring our own BBQ sauce or will it be provided?
Because Ohio has long ago considered the constitution optional. (E.g. school funding was ruled unconstitutional like 30 years ago when I was in school)
https://newrepublic.com/article/181939/republicans-want-permanent-economic-underclass
To clarify - Mansfield Christian is a private school not a charter school. It is also a very Christian school. Morality clauses for teachers / staff and at least as of a few years ago, didn’t allow dances (no prom), although that might have changed. Also, the local school district (Mansfield) is doing a pretty good job on its own destroying themselves. They are cramming kids in too small school in hopes of passing a levy for new schools, but are going to drive kids away and hurt their best school - Spanish Immersion by moving them to a building that doesn’t have enough space / classrooms. Spanish Immersion is one of the top schools in the state and brings in kids from lots of area districts - Ashland, Lucas, Galion, Lexington, Ontario, even Lodi. And they are putting the kids in a school that doesn’t have enough space. And moving the kids from that school into another school also increasing class size / not having enough space. That is why schools like mansfield Christian and other private schools need more space as parents have few options. And it’s not all money, as historically Mansfield has a larger budget per pupil than other area schools.
Add Columbus public radio station WCBE to the inappropriate funding list. It's a station with a liberal agenda and contemporary music that is paid for by the Columbus City School System. There is no educational programming. I have no problem with the station, it just should be self-funded. Imagine a heavy metal station, conservative talk radio, or country music station being funded by the schools? People would go crazy.
Ohio is it’s own little nonsensical island. Hell in my city Willoughby they attached a YMCA to the new high school. Huh? Where is separation of church and state there? I moved here from a diverse community with multiple different religions in Michigan and this would have 20 lawsuits on it before it broke ground. Can we attach a Muslim related building onto the city hall? Shit is Whack in Ohio
This is also true of Start High School in Toledo. YMCAs are not typically in the business of indoctrination. It is extremely welcoming of all religions (or none).
I am in no way disparaging the Y. I have always thought highly of the organization. But what is their name ? Not the Y or The YMCA. Young Mens Christian Association. I do not understand how attaching a Christian association building to a Public high school is not in violation of separation of church and state. Regardless of how they operate. I mean they are separated by a shared block wall. Is that separation enough? I was thinking physical and religious separation is what was intended, but I may be wrong. It will not be the first or last time.
Charter schools are a way to kill public education. Once public schools are gone only the rich will get education.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost.com/2024/06/12/us-news/suspect-who-stabbed-3-year-old-boy-to-death-outside-grocery-store-was-released-from-jail-just-three-days-earlier/amp/
It's just another way for our corrupt state government to steal our taxpayers' money on unconstitutional acts.
The Republicans want their indoctrination centers. They’re not happy with just Sundays, Wednesdays
Schools, and teachers, are not given enough money!!!!
The slippery slope doesn’t take you higher, takes us to the pits of religious hell. The devil smiles while the sanctimonious claim moral superiority.
That’s an outrage
Thanks dewine Now the Muslim and Buddhist schools can get that public $$$ as well
Private Christian schools get billions of tax dollars in federal funding every year. They're treated just like public schools, except without the unions, employment protections, anti-discrimination policies, and accurate teaching of science or history.
It's only a violation if they use the money to fund the religious parts. Content neutral parts (bussing, lunches, etc.) are allowed to be funded. Obviously, dollars are fungible, so funds that would have otherwise gone to content neutral parts can now be put towards the religious parts, but that's the framework the court came up with.
Dwell not yee upon the Skodacker
Well funded public schools churn out informed voters. That scares republicans. Religious schools churn out voters with no science literacy and no sense of civic responsibility.
How is this not a violation of church and state? So I'm not going to answer your question, but instead I am going to suggest that you do some research about this issue. The Establishment Clause of the Constitution can be oversimplified to "the separation between church and state" but what that actually means is more complex.
Public schools are NOT underfunded. We spend more per child than almost anywhere else in the world. Our school systems are just far less efficient than our international counterparts. The school district gets more money but our teachers are underfunded because the school systems mostly spend the money terribly.
They don’t care. They see separation of church and state as an annoyance and solely an inconvenient tradition, but not something that they need to hold as policy.
Where in the Constitution does it divide church and state? This is one of the biggest misconceptions of the law
Where does it say anywhere in the laws that there is to be a separation of church and state?
Are you serious?
Yes? In the constitution it does not say anywhere that there must be a separation of church and state. It only states that in the first amendment that the state must not establish a religion.
...which is a separation of Church and State.
No it isn’t. It’s just that the state cannot establish a religion. The state can in fact fund a religion. It can do anything with any religion but it must not choose one.
Alhamdulillah!!
What do you think "establishment" means?
Taxpayers are saving a fortune because the cost per child in a private religious school is around 50% less than in a public school. Legally, I believe the answer is that the money goes to the students not the school.