Christian Family Fights World History Course Lesson on Islam

    When Caleigh Wood was a junior in high school, she took a world history course which was required for graduation. In the class, one of the lesson topics was “The Muslim World” and Islam. During the lesson which spanned over the course of approximately a week, Wood was exposed to a PowerPoint slide which included the statement “Most Muslim’s faith is stronger than the average Christian”. The slide was being used to contrast peaceful Islam with radical fundamental Islam. In addition to the PowerPoint presentation, one of the assignments that Wood was required to complete included a fill-in-the-blank section about the shahada which is an Islamic declaration of faith. The statement read “There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah”. After seeing the assignment, Wood’s father encouraged her not to complete any other work that was contrary to the family’s Christian beliefs. As a result, Wood received a lower grade, but it did not severely affect her final grade in the course.

    This case has implications for the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, and the Compelled Speech Doctrine of the First Amendment. For the interest of time and based on this week’s case readings, I will be focusing on the Establishment Clause perspective of this case. The issue is whether the lessons and assignments given to Wood can be considered as an establishment of religion and therefore unconstitutional. In the end, the judges decided in favor of the school district, ruling that there was no establishment of religion that violated the First Amendment.

    Wood’s parents took the issue to court and argued that the materials clearly lacked a secular purpose and were promoting and endorsing Islam. Wood and others argued that it not only promoted Islam but degraded Christianity and forced Wood to write things that she did not believe. The school district argued that religious education is necessary because it is history and cannot be separated or ignored. Rather, the way to teach about religion is from a secular perspective. However, in the decision, the court did include that the school’s content specialist had deemed the slide in question as inappropriate and would have advised the teacher to either change it or not include it in the lesson.

    Charles C. Haynes, a founding director of the Religious Freedom Center cited the constant fears of terrorism since 9/11 and the continually growing fear of Islam as greatly influencing how Islam is treated in public schools and education as a whole. Haynes argued that even with poor phrasing, a single presentation or assignment may not be unconstitutional unless there is a clear pattern. Similar to many other educational related court cases, courts tend to steer away from making judgements on every single issue, and instead defer to educators to make calls on what and what is not appropriate. The judges in this case agreed with putting school authorities in charge of the classrooms rather than the courts. The judges believed that if they were to examine each and every statement made by teachers, academic freedom and exploration would be in jeopardy.

    In this case, I believe that that court made the correct decision in favoring the school district. Education and specifically public schools represent such a combative and stressful environment for such laws, so there are many facts to consider in deciding this case. The school district focused on the course’s entire curriculum instead of simply the presentation and assignments for the study of Islam. I agree with their decision because focusing on such an individual statement would create a slippery slope scenario and set a dangerous precedent. If this simple assignment and/or slide presentation were to be deemed as establishments of religion, it would open up the court to unlimited issues surrounding most likely any study of religion at public schools. Additionally, Wood was not compelled to state any beliefs or statements against her will as the assignment had the purpose of testing the students’ understandings of the lessons.

    In the case Illinois ex. rel. McCollum v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court found that the use of public-school property for religious classes violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. In the case, the school was allowing an outside program to bring in religious teachers to teach during the regular school day. That is not the case here. Here, the lesson was part of a public-school curriculum, specifically a world history course, and it did not take away from the regular school hours as it was built into the schedule. In this case, no aid, direct or indirect, is provided to the schools by the government, maintaining a separation of church and state.

    A strong counter argument can be made that the statements not only promoted Islam, but degraded Christianity, a fact which might have had Justice Douglas from Zorach v. Clauson, a case which dealt with New York City public schools allowing children to leave during school hours to attend religious institutions, to argue that this event did classify as an establishment of religion. However, I believe that the court was right to examine this occurrence as a part of the course curriculum and see if there appeared to be an establishment of religion in the course as a whole. However, in Engel v. Vitale, the Supreme Court ruled that the reading aloud of prayers in public school violated the Establishment Clause and Justice Black referenced the First Amendment as the ultimate safe guard to ensure that the government could “control, support, or influence” the prayers of the American people (Munoz 106). In this case, Wood had no governmental pressure to say anything against her religion. Despite the specific statements which were deemed inappropriate for the lesson, the lack of a pattern of pro-Islam and/or anti-Christianity ideals, the lack of governmental aid or support of the course, and the status of the course as a public school world history class denote this case as not a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.