School Choice Could Defuse Culture War Fights
During oral arguments, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson questioned the plaintiffs' case. "I'm struggling to see how it burdens a parent's religious exercise if the school teaches something that the parent disagrees with," Jackson said. "You have a choice. You don't have to send your kid to that school. You can put them in another situation."
Practically speaking, many families don't have a viable educational alternative in Maryland. Without robust school choice, families on the losing end of zero-sum culture war clashes in public schools have little recourse.
Despite Jackson's claims to the contrary, most families cannot just put their children in "another situation." Only low-income students are eligible to receive Maryland's voucher, valued at less than $3,000 during the 2024–25 school year. This would cover just a fraction of the $14,500 average private elementary school tuition in Maryland.
The laws governing public school transfers in Maryland are some of the nation's weakest. Maryland is one of four states—along with Alaska, Maine, and North Carolina—that score 0 out of 100 points on Reason Foundation's scoresheet ranking states' K-12 open enrollment laws. This means the right to transfer to other public schools that have space isn't codified in state law.
Even if the school districts bordering MCPS let some of these students transfer, they could charge them out-of-pocket tuition, just like private schools. For instance, the neighboring Frederick County and Howard County Public Schools charged transfers $9,000 and $12,700, respectively, during the 2024–25 school year.
Moreover, no charter schools currently operate in Montgomery County (although its first is set to launch in Fall 2025). The school board has long opposed them, sparking criticism from the Maryland Board of Education.
When the district told families they could no longer opt their elementary-aged children out of the controversial lessons at the beginning of the 2023–24 school year, some parents chose to withdraw their children from MCPS at great personal cost. One family gave up their home and moved in with grandparents so they could afford private school tuition. Another family chose to homeschool their daughter with Down syndrome, sacrificing $25,000 in special services provided by MCPS.
Notably, plaintiffs in Mahmoud are asking only to opt out of specific lessons that violate their religious convictions. They aren't demanding that the district change its curriculum. Opt-out policies are a common practice in public education, and families in many states have long been able to withdraw their children from sex education classes.
That said, the advocates on Justice Jackson's side of the argument have a point: Where does it stop? There are many other areas where public schools might potentially adopt a curriculum that conflicts with individual religious beliefs. There may be a point at which it becomes overly burdensome for schools to let families opt out of everything they object to while still being enrolled.
Hence the need for school choice. When families don't have alternatives, public schools become a battleground for disputes. It becomes impossible to fully accommodate a diverse population with varying values and convictions.
The Court should rule in the plaintiffs' favor and let the parents opt out. But families shouldn't have to wait for a high court decision to have access to choice in education.
The post School Choice Could Defuse Culture War Fights appeared first on Reason.com.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Axios
an hour ago
- Axios
Judge blocks Arkansas Ten Commandments law
A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked an Arkansas law that would require all public school classrooms to display the Ten Commandments. It was set to take effect next week. Why it matters: Nearly 500,000 students will return to Arkansas classrooms this month. Some supporters see the Ten Commandments as a historical document that helped shape U.S. law, but the plaintiffs argue that displaying the document in public schools would infringe on their constitutional right to freedom of religion. State of play: Arkansas Act 573, passed by the state Legislature this year and signed into law by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, would require that every "public institution of higher education and elementary and secondary school library and classroom in the state" prominently display a copy of the "historical representation of the Ten Commandments." The posters were to be at least 16 inches by 20 inches and in a legible typeface. All copies were to be donated or purchased through private funds, but if a donated copy didn't meet the requirements, the school could replace it using public funds. The big picture: In his ruling, U.S. Western District of Arkansas Judge Timothy Brooks cited similar laws in nearby Louisiana and Texas. The Louisiana law has been declared unconstitutional, and the Texas law is being challenged, though a ruling hasn't yet been declared. Oklahoma's state superintendent issued guidelines last year that every classroom have a copy of the Bible and the Ten Commandments and that teachers should include the documents in the curriculum. The guidance is being challenged. At least 15 other states had proposed some form of the law as of February. What they're saying: "Forty-five years ago, the Supreme Court struck down a Ten Commandments law nearly identical to the one the Arkansas General Assembly passed earlier this year. That precedent remains binding on this Court and renders Arkansas Act 573 plainly unconstitutional," Judge Brooks wrote in the ruling. "Why would Arkansas pass an obviously unconstitutional law? Most likely because the State is part of a coordinated strategy among several states to inject Christian religious doctrine into public-school classrooms." The other side: "In Arkansas, we do in fact believe that murder is wrong and stealing is bad. It is entirely appropriate to display the Ten Commandments — the basis of all Western law and morality — as a reminder to students, state employees, and every Arkansan who enters a government building," Sanders said in a statement emailed to Axios.
Forbes
an hour ago
- Forbes
One Year After Loper: Congress Must Step Up
In the year since the Supreme Court in Loper Bright v. Raimondo ended four decades of judicial deference to federal agencies' interpretations of their statutory authority, courts are invalidating more administrative rules, and the executive branch is reviewing and considering repealing regulations that may be contrary to the decision. Congress is weighing its response, too. Last week the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Subcommittee on Border Management, Federal Workforce and Regulatory Affairs held a hearing titled 'The Future is Loper Bright: Congress's Role in the Regulatory Landscape.' I was honored to testify at the hearing, which Chairman James Lankford (R-OK) held to 'chart a clear path forward on what Congress must do.' My testimony noted that while legislators will no longer be able to pass ambiguous laws with the expectation that agencies' interpretations will get deference, Congress will not necessarily have to write statutory language that is detailed and prescriptive. Laws that delegate broad authority could defer to agency fact-finding and policy expertise, as long as they do so unambiguously. I suggested that an important step in writing less ambiguous law would be to more clearly distinguish between questions of fact (such as, does a chemical show adverse effects in laboratory experiments?), questions of policy (what restrictions should be placed on that chemical?), and questions in between (such as, how to extrapolate the findings from high-dose animal experiments to low-dose human exposure). Participants at a National Academy of Sciences workshop observed that recognizing that all those factors are essential to sound policy and encouraging agencies to be transparent about how each inform their decisions would contribute greatly to statutory clarity. To that end, I offered four recommendations. First, legislation should recognize that while scientific facts are a necessary element of good policy design, they are almost never sufficient. Many regulatory decisions involve what noted physicist Alvin Weinberg called 'trans-science,' factors relating to questions that science can inform but not answer. Statutes can allow agencies to 'fill up the details,' while requiring them to be transparent about the studies, assumptions, models, and other trans-science factors they rely on. Second, Congress should provide agencies with clear guidance on how they should weigh competing considerations. For example, new legislation could embrace longstanding executive requirements for regulatory impact analysis, including benefit-cost analysis, to ensure that agencies consider tradeoffs transparently and systematically. Statutes like the Safe Drinking Water Act, which explicitly authorize agencies to balance tradeoffs, have proven more effective and less acrimonious than laws (like sections of the Clean Air Act) that seem to preclude such analysis. Law Professor Chad Squitieri, another witness at the hearing, reiterated that Congress could clarify that terms like 'appropriate' are intended to permit the consideration of such tradeoffs. Third, to better inform reauthorizations and promote a culture of learning, Congress should require agencies to evaluate their regulations periodically to determine how effective they are at achieving legislative goals, and to identify needed revisions both to the regulations and the underlying statutory authority. Such feedback loops would ensure that policies evolve with new evidence and changing circumstances. Fourth, to support these efforts, Congress itself needs more resources, a point emphasized by witness Allyson Schwartz, a former member of Congress and Senior Fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center, which published a report on 'Legislating After Loper.' A dedicated congressional regulatory office—a counterpart to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs as the Congressional Budget Office is to the Office of Management and Budget—could help lawmakers draft clearer statutes and better understand the legal and policy implications of proposed legislation. Members at the hearing recognized the challenges going forward. Senator Maggie Hassan (D-NH) said Congress 'needs to make its intent clear when passing legislation so federal agencies can effectively deliver government services.' Ranking Member John Fetterman (D-PA) observed that the Loper decision represented a huge change and said, 'the pressure is on us now; we need to be more active in legislating.' Chairman Lankford put it more bluntly, saying Congress needs to 'suck it up and do our job.' He asked witnesses to identify ambiguous words that legislation should avoid. The new legal landscape places greater responsibility on Congress to write less ambiguous statutes that more clearly recognize the different considerations—legal, scientific and policy—that go into writing effective rules. By requiring agencies to lay out their judgments and assumptions transparently, explicitly authorizing them to weigh important tradeoffs, and requiring better ex-post evaluation, Congress can ensure that regulatory decisions are more transparent, accountable and grounded in both sound science and legitimate policy judgment.
Boston Globe
2 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Columbia and Brown to disclose admissions and race data in Trump deal
Advertisement But college officials and experts who support using factors beyond test scores worry that the government — or private groups or individuals — will use the data to file new discrimination charges against universities and threaten their federal funding. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up The Trump administration is using every lever it can to push elite college admissions offices toward what it regards as 'merit-based' processes that more heavily weigh grades and test scores, arguing that softer measures, such as asking applicants about their life challenges or considering where they live, may be illegal proxies for considering race. The additional scrutiny is likely to resonate in admissions offices nationwide. It could cause some universities to reconsider techniques like recruitment efforts focused on high schools whose students are predominantly people of color, or accepting students who have outstanding qualifications in some areas but subpar test scores, even if they believe such actions are legal. Advertisement 'The Trump administration's ambition here is to send a chill through admissions offices all over the country,' said Justin Driver, a Yale Law School professor who just wrote a book about the Supreme Court and affirmative action and who said he believed that the administration's understanding of the Supreme Court's affirmative action decision was wrong. 'They are trying to get universities to depress Black and brown enrollment.' The Trump administration has celebrated getting this data as part of its war on 'woke' university policies such as affirmative action and diversity, equity and inclusion programs that it says discriminate based on race. 'Because of the Trump administration's resolution agreement with Brown University, aspiring students will be judged solely on their merits, not their race or sex,' Linda McMahon, the secretary of education, said when the Brown deal was announced, echoing similar comments she had made about Columbia. 'Woke is officially DEAD at Brown,' President Donald Trump proclaimed on Truth Social in announcing the deal. The public release of race-related data on admissions could also be valuable to conservative groups who have become the self-appointed enforcers of the Supreme Court decision. 'If this information were obtainable by a Freedom of Information Act request or made public, it would be of great interest,' said Adam Mortara, one of the lawyers for Students for Fair Admissions, the plaintiff in the Supreme Court affirmative action case. 'If we could get this and analyze it, we would because we are constantly vigilant and looking out for those who seem not to have gotten the message.' Advertisement Columbia and Brown will have to maintain 'merit-based admissions policies,' according to their settlements, which codify the administration's broader aims in legally binding language. The universities 'may not by any means unlawfully preference applicants based on race, color or national origin in admissions throughout its programs,' both agreements state in identical language. 'No proxy for racial admission will be tolerated.' The admissions disclosures will provide the government with data on accepted and rejected applicants broken down by 'race, color, grade point average and performance on standardized tests.' While it is not clear what Brown's and Columbia's data will reveal, general data shows that admissions systems that are focused on standardized tests typically help Asian students and harm the chances of Black students. Of the high school graduates who scored between 1400 and 1600 on the SAT in 2024, the highest possible scores, 1% were African American, and 27% were Asian, according to the College Board, the private organization that administers the test. About 12% of students taking the test were Black, and 10% were Asian. Some experts consider the tests to be unfair because there are score gaps by race and class. Student demographics at Columbia and Brown had already started to shift as the 2023 Supreme Court decision took effect. Among first-year undergraduates entering Columbia in fall 2024, 39% were Asian, and 12% were Black. In the fall of 2023, the entering class was 30% Asian and 20% Black. (White and Hispanic enrollment dropped slightly from 2023 to 2024). At Brown, Asian and white first-year enrollment went up from fall 2023 to fall 2024, while Hispanic and Black enrollment decreased. Not all Ivy League universities, however, showed the same effect. Advertisement Applicants to Columbia have the option of not submitting standardized test scores, complicating any analysis. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, a federal statistical agency, about 61% of first-year Columbia undergraduates in fall 2023 had submitted test scores. Brown has returned to requiring test scores from applicants. In a letter to the campus, Christina H. Paxson, the president of Brown, said that the federal government was already entitled to the new data from Brown or any other university as part of compliance with civil rights laws. She said she was not worried about releasing the material, saying it would 'demonstrate the strong academic qualifications of the classes we admit while remaining committed to welcoming students from a wide range of backgrounds.' Columbia also explained in a recent fact sheet that the data would be anonymized and that it had an obligation to comply with the law. 'We have agreed to provide data to which the government is entitled, and is currently requesting from scores of institutions, including ours,' Claire Shipman, Columbia's acting president, said when the deal was announced. The Trump administration already appears to be asking for similar data under subpoena. In March, Attorney General Pam Bondi directed the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division to review admissions policies at Stanford University and three University of California institutions: UCLA, Berkeley and Irvine. 'The Department of Justice will put an end to a shameful system in which someone's race matters more than their ability,' Chad Mizelle, the acting associate attorney general, said in March. 'Every college and university should know that illegal discrimination in admissions will be investigated and eliminated.' Advertisement The language used in the settlements with Columbia and Brown hammers home contested assertions about the Supreme Court admissions case that the Trump administration has been making since February. It insists that the decision goes beyond admissions and bars any consideration of race in university life. Many legal experts disagree with this interpretation and point out that the decision pointedly said that colleges could still consider, on a case-by-case basis, 'an applicant's discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration or otherwise.' 'The law is clear: Treating students differently on the basis of race to achieve nebulous goals such as diversity, racial balancing, social justice or equity is illegal under controlling Supreme Court precedent,' the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights argued in an official guidance letter to all educational institutions in February. Under this thinking, colleges could not lawfully eliminate the use of standardized testing in admissions if doing so was part of an effort to achieve a desired racial balance or to increase racial diversity. Federal law would also not allow race to be considered in hiring, promotion, scholarships or housing decisions. 'If an educational institution treats a person of one race differently than it treats another person because of that person's race, the educational institution violates the law,' the February letter said. Enforcement of that guidance document was put on hold in April because of a legal challenge. Last week, Bondi made another attempt to make her interpretation of the Supreme Court decision enforceable, providing similar guidance that applies to all entities receiving federal funding. Bondi's guidance states that even seemingly race-neutral criteria, such as asking an applicant about 'cultural competence' or 'lived experience,' or targeting recruitment based on geography, violates federal law if it is designed or applied with the intention of giving an advantage to applicants based on protected characteristics, such as race. Advertisement Even a scholarship program that targets 'underserved geographic areas' or 'first-generation students' would not be legal if those criteria are chosen to increase participation by specific racial or sex-based groups, the guidance states. 'I think transparency is a good thing, and if Columbia is not using racial preferences, they should have nothing to hide,' said Richard Kahlenberg, director of the American Identity Project at the Progressive Policy Institute, a left-of-center think tank. Kahlenberg has pushed for class-conscious rather than race-conscious college admissions. But the data the government is demanding could be misused, he said, to suggest that 'any attempt to create racial diversity even by race-neutral means is problematic.' This article originally appeared in .
