It shouldn’t be all that hard to touch upon the largest religions that have had a great deal of influence over the last few thousands years. A lesson plan for a semester long survey course where students learned a smattering of the history and beliefs of Hinduism, Buddhism, as well as Islam, Judaism, and Christianity would not be a difficult thing to come up with. I don’t even thing it would be hard to sell this to the general population though you will likely have some people who are up in arms about it. Hell, make the class an elective and you probably don’t have to worry about those who are against the class.
The basic ideas of whose faith?
Not suggesting that at all - what I am suggesting is that it is a constitutional minefield. By including a religion and excluding another, a school or district opens itself up to legal action regarding endorsement. It may make sense for the district to not offer the class to avoid potentially costly litigation.
I actually support such a course, as part of a general introduction to ethics and philosphy. But it is extremely difficult to do it in such a way that won’t create constitutional questions.
Simply making a class voluntary doesn’t remove constitutional questions about it.
Just what exactly should be taught is a problem every curriculum be it history, literature, or even science grapples with. That doesn’t stop schools from offering courses on literature, science, mathematics, and history.
I don’t wish to insult educators but most of them are not what we would call experts in their respective fields. The high school history teacher --provided his first name isn’t Coach-- might have an undergraduate degree in history but that does not make him a historian. Obviously any teacher who was going to teach a course on comparative religion would have to be prepared to to so just as they would be prepared to teach history or literature. Whether the majority of them are Christian or not really doesn’t matter.
Odesio
Edit: Upon further reflection this is probably a hijacking of the OP. Apologies.
Again, I see that as much more of a details thing. Obviously stuff like Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, etc. are covered. And, chances are, in some districts a particular minor religion might be more worth covering than another if it happens to have a pocket of adherents. I think this is something that can be addressed.
I just don’t see it as a constitutional minefield. There’s zero endorsement, just a covering of relevant religious philosophies. Obviously, you can’t cover every religion, and perhaps allowing a little bit of space in the subjects covered would let certain districts with some uncommon beliefs cover those with that space in the curriculum.
Regardless, I don’t think you’ll see any meaningful constitutional objections, and I’d still much rather face that risk and have most of the population not be ignorant about the majority of religions than be afraid to face such a thing. Hell, we’re already facing that sort of threat over the subject in the OP of religion vs science in a science classroom.
As a relevant anecdote, I had a history teacher in high school who had very blatant liberal views. Similarly, I had a biology teacher who spent the whole first day insulting theists and anyone who had any doubt in evolution at all… he didn’t last.
There’s always going to be skewed perspectives because teachers are human beings who have opinions, but that doesn’t mean we don’t teach controversial subjects, we just need to have well defined curricula so we can smack them around when they deviate.
Wow. It’s almost like exactly that point was addressed earlier.
Yes, we are. While a good number of the “average” kids will end up in retail, cooking, etc., by sentencing them to garbage education you are dooming everyone unfortunate enough to not be on the islands to being unable to move out of those jobs. Class mobility is a key principle of capitalism, and I for one am not willing to sacrifice it for spurious benefits for the rich and famous, which they already have. Furthermore, there are only so many jobs that don’t require any sort of education. We’re already having a problem in this economy with them being over-filled. In a world where 9 out of 10 middle managers, IT guys, engineers, chefs and the like are unqualified for their jobs that problem would skyrocket.
Or would take the government money and “homeschool” their children using some sort of method of neglect while pocketing the money.
One thing having children has taught me is that people have completely different value sets when raising their kids. We have a sort of middle of the road approach - I don’t want kids who spend five hours a night studying - I want kids who play. But I do want kids who do their homework and perform according to their abilities. There are parents who want high achievers and push to get them. And there are parents to whom putting their kids on the bus every morning is a huge burden that they would be happy to get rid of so they can sleep in. Then those uneducated children become illiterate grown ups who cannot support themselves.
Now, I suppose you could create a government organization that makes sure that kids are educated to some sort of standard. Maybe give them tests each year. And then when parents aren’t filling their roles to ensure children are educated to some sort of basic competence, you’d put the kids into some sort of facility to make sure they could pass the tests. Then parents who don’t want to bother doing the research to put their child into an appropriate private facility could just opt in to those “public facilities” from day one. Since you have those kids there, you might want to aggregate transportation for them. And you might as well work towards more than basic competence - after all their parents laziness shouldn’t keep them from having opportunities.
It can be addressed, but it is tough. It’s the crux of the constitutionality of it, so I find it amusing that you consider it a “details thing.”
Moreover, it isn’t a radical reading of the First Amendment to see it as existing to provide special protection to minority viewpoints. The idea that Government should teach a religion as long as enough people already believe it might cause issues there.
In your view there is zero endorsement. It really isn’t as clear cut as you think. It can be done, but even udner current Establishment Clause jurisprudence, there is a reason that schools often steer very clear of such classes.
I think there are many more important things for us to worry about than whether people are leaving school ignorant about the majority of religions.
The goal of ensuring that “children understand the basic ideas of their faith” is not the same as a “scholarly review of religion.”
A scholarly review of religion would be done without reference to any goal regarding the particular personal faith of the students.
First, I don’t accept his argument, I don’t think it will result in pockets of excellence in general garbage, but as he was asserting it, it seemed to me to undermine it. Second, you’re conflating above average students with rich and famous, which isn’t a perfect correlation; besides, as it stands now, the rich and famous already have access to better education by virtue of sending their children to public schools.
But, really, I just don’t see how introducing choice into the system can possibly make it worse than it already is. Now, kids have to go to a certain school, and if they are underfunded or just plain bad, well, tough; any kids that very well may be able to work their way out of a bad situation and stuck wallowing in mediocrity.
And, honestly, I see the opposite problem with qualifications, where a number of people are perhaps underqualified for that particular job in terms of relevant experience, but overqualified in terms of overall education. I see a lot of kdis with college degrees making coffee or shelving books. What if those sorts of jobs like most IT work, cookss, etc. could get that sort of training they need for their jobs by virtue of having more choice in their primary and secondary education?
No, you really didn’t. Unless you equate teaching someone about a religion with an endorsement of said religion. There’s no violation of the establishment clause here.
No - the comparison to literature.
So presumably you would not see it as a problem if in these religious classes, the only religion taught about was Christianity? Or indeed the Southern Baptist variant of Christianity? After all, you are just teaching the kids about the religion, you aren’t endorsing it.
Another idea that would never work. The great majority of the people who want religion to be taught in school want their religion and theirs alone to be taught. It isn’t the unbelievers who are the majority of those opposing such a thing; most of us realize that a general overview of religion is a great way of promoting atheism. Deep down so do most believers I suspect even if they don’t like to admit it to themselves. Which is why the only religious class they would accept would be one that taught their religion to be true and didn’t even mention the existence of other religions except as evil or heretical. Which would of would be Constitutionally unacceptable.
Since a Constitutionally acceptable religious education class wouldn’t be acceptable to most of the people who want religion in school in the first place, they don’t have one at all. You won’t see such classes in public schools unless it becomes possible for them to be about nothing why Christianity is the One True Way, and even then there’ll be screaming from the people who feel that the right sort of Christianity isn’t being being taught.
You have a cite for this, or are you using your amazing mind reading powers again?
I think it’s a fair assessment. Would a creationist be okay with a teacher teaching their kid that “Lord Brahma created the universe” is an equally likely alternative to Genesis?
One key flaw in your argument is that only (or mainly) creationists want religion taught in school. Another flaw is that religion would be taught that way in schools.
I’m an atheist, and I think it would be a good idea to have a HS class in world religions.
But again, if you have a cite, I’d love to see it. Pardon me if I don’t trust anyone’s amazing mind reading powers.
ETA: About 25% of Americans are Catholics-- the largest denomination by far. Let’s look at what is taught at the Catholic High School near me, namely Bellarmine College Prep in San Jose.
Well, what do you know… a course in World Religions. This is at a school that is explicitly religious in its founding and operation.
A world religions class is taught in the public high school near me. You can take it as an elective, along with Western Civ.
(American History and Civics are, IIRC, mandated by the state, but as a senior, you have to take another year of “social sciences” and World Religions or Western Civ count).
Here’s how choice can make it worse:
Imagine a school system with choice in it. There’s a really good school, and a school that’s pretty mediocre.
The kids with very involved parents end up at the really good school, which probably fills to capacity. The kids whose parents don’t really pay attention until the truancy officer comes knocking send their kid to wherever has slots available–the mediocre school.
The kids at the mediocre school end up in an environment with other kids whose parents are uninvolved in their education. They’ll probably come to school without the set of habits and values that make school a successful place for them, unlike the kids at the good school. Class will be full of kids who by default are unengaged, and they’ll bounce off one another, creating, by default, more unengagement.
There’ll be Stand and Deliver teachers, sure, but not many of them. Most teachers will really struggle to involve these kids. Then they’ll turn around and get shat on for the low test scores by the public, and a cycle will start to reinforce itself, with the next tier of barely-involved parents waking up and removing their kids. The non-saintly teachers will try to move to a different school; most of the folks who stay there will be folks who can’t get accepted elsewhere.
And there’ll be more openings, just in time for the next round of kids picked up by the truancy officers. And generational poverty will be even more profoundly reinforced than it is today.
Sure, the really terrible schools might shut down given enough choice. But the cycle I’m describing already happens, to a lesser degree, in some districts where some level of choice is provided. It’s not a good thing at all.