Weekly Religious Education - or within-school-day Bible study - has existed in Virginia for almost 80 years, and has faced down numerous opponents. But now NCLB requirements are being touted as a reason to eradicate the program:
It's been challenged in the courts, closely watched by opponents and questioned by parents of new students every fall, but Weekday Religious Education hangs on, protected under a Supreme Court decision that affords it the constitutional right to take public school children from classwork for Bible study.
Now WRE has a new foe threatening its school day operation: stringent and increasing state and federal academic standards...
In August, the Harrisonburg School Board cut WRE from its school day. The 30 to 45 minutes used each week to provide Bible study would be better spent on instructional time, the board decided. Last Monday, a group of Staunton parents asked the city School Board to conduct its WRE class after school, citing the same academic concerns. By 2014, the federal No Child Left Behind law will require all students in public schools to pass standardized tests, or the school system could lose funding.
Interesting dilemma. I was unaware of WRE, and I find it telling that NCLB is being touted as a reason to discontinue Bible study during the school day. Aren't educators usually complaining that programs shouldn't be cut to force the focus back to basic skills?
"The weekday release of some students to WRE is jeopardizing the academic progress of all students and their ability to perform well on the standardized tests by which Adequate Yearly Progress is measured," parent Beverly Riddell told the Staunton board last week.
"Last year there were supplemental after-school academic review programs offered at some elementary schools to help prepare these students to pass the SOLs," she said. "Yet, students were still being released during school hours for WRE."
Color me naive, but why would releasing some students for WRE jeopardize the progress of all students? Certainly the program doesn't interfere with the learning of others. Now, if the WRE students were doing poorly on exams, their performance may cause the school's reputation to suffer - but are there data to suggest that WRE students are in fact bombing the exams?
JoAnne Shirley, state director of WRE and a former public school teacher, said she doesn't see the half-hour program as a threat to curriculum. The WRE council keeps up with the Standards of Learning for each grade and incorporates them into the Bible study, she said.
"Being on the other side of things, having been a teacher, I know there is great pressure on the teachers, SOLs, No Child Left Behind," she said. "My concern, though, is how is 30 minutes (a week) of the children's time going to make a difference?"
That's my concern, too. This is an optional program, held off school grounds, and students only attend with parental permission. If a student is doing poorly in school, wouldn't a parent be more likely to withhold permission to attend?
So what's at stake for both sides of this issue as the fight for instructional time ensues? WRE advocates like Shirley say it's time well spent -- offering children spiritual guidance and character lessons, as well as academic study.
Opponents like Riddell say every minute counts and Bible study should be considered an elective and instructional time kept to work toward mandated standards.
We're talking only 30 minutes a week here. And I'll say it again - it's odd to see educators so fiercely taking the let's-cut-all-the-fat streamlining approach, when normally there's a great outcry when programs are cut to make way for more basic skills instruction.
Posted by kswygert at November 14, 2004 03:16 PM