Baton Rouge Parish School System & 29:11 Mentoring Families School Event Or Religious Activity
A local non-profit organization in Baton Rouge, Louisiana named “29:11 Mentoring Families” partnered with the East Baton Rouge Parish School System to host an event earlier this week. School officials state that this event was a Conference and College Fair held at the Living Faith Christian Center in Baton Rouge. For this event, more than 2100 students from Baton Rouge high schools were excused from classes to attend. In addition to this, the East Baton Rouge Parish School System stated they committed to spending $9,800 to help underwrite the cost of the “Day of Hope Student Conference & College Fair” as well as to bus students to and from the event. In addition to this, the founder of 29:11 Mentoring Families, Tramaine, stated the organization had a “real partnership with the school system”. Therefore, both the School System and organization were equally evolved in the Day of Hope Student Conference & College Fair.
The 29:11 organized the event in reference to a biblical verse in the Book of Jeremiah and the homepage of its website shows a picture of the past event with young people on stage with up-raised hands with “Jesus” displayed on a big screen. The event was supposed to be a College Fair event; however, both 29:11 Mentoring Families and the East Baton Rouge Parish School System received backlash after both students and parents went on social media claiming the school field trip was more of a religious event which they didn't agree to.
Several students stated that they were separated according to their sex. Once separated, the male students were asked to leave while female students watched three different series of lectures by three different guests. The female students said the three speakers spoke about personal experiences with being a virgin during college, sexual assault, and suicide. When the male students turned inside, they stated they engaged in passive games for prizes such as “who could do the most push-ups”.
In addition to this, the students were also enraged that they had to participate in a prayer that the adults initiated. Overall, the students stated that the field trip was more of religious activity than a college and career fair event, and left with a feeling of being lured into the twisted religious event through the school-sponsored field trip.
The Chief of Communications for the East Baton Rouge Parish School System, Letrece Griffin, and other school officials reject complaints from both parents and students who attended the controversial “Day of Hope'' senior field trip. Instead, they stated that the Day of Hope was not a religious event and many of the religious components of prayers were spontaneous and initiated by the students. In addition to this, Griffin stated that the reason for the difference in treatment between the male and female students was due to the buses arriving late to the event. Due to the buses arriving late, the male sessions had to be drastically reduced, and the male session still addressed issues such as responsibility, healthy choices, and the importance of camaraderie.
The holding of this event is related to establishment clauses of the constitution. The “Establishment” clause of the First Amendment states that public schools “may not impose prayer or other religious practices on students, even if students are not required to participate”. Many parents and students believe that both the Baton Rouge Parish School System & 29:11 Mentoring Families Non-Profit lured students into attending the religious event they did not agree to. I do agree that this College-Fair was religious in its formation and organization. To begin with, the organization created this event in reference to a biblical verse, as opposed to a secularly created event. In addition to this, it was stated that this event was held in the past and was strongly connected to religious background. Already the creation and organization of this event were religiously rooted. To further this, the event was held in a church where it was stated that prayers were initiated and other religiously based discussions were discriminately placed on students. Lastly, it was stated that this event was partnered with the Baton Rouge Parish School Systems, which spent money on the event and was responsible for the transportation of thousands of students attending the event.
With these various things being established, it is difficult to argue that this event was not religiously rooted and therefore infringe on students' rights by being required to attend this event.
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