My bad, read thread title hastily.
Never . . . but I’m old enough to remember when “under God” was added to the Pledge of Allegiance. And I don’t recall there being any controversy.
In High School we had the moment of silence at the end of the morning announcements. No one used the moment to pray aloud, as far as I recall, and certainly no one led the class in prayer. On of the Jews, Muslims, Atheists, or the one Hindu certainly would have made noise if it had happened. I don’t think I was ever there at the beginning of any football games, but one of the star players was a Muslim, so probably not there either. And definitely not before swim meats, not even before we left the locker room (we used that time to psych ourselves up with heavy metal).
I don’t remember the parts of middle and elementary school that were in America, but I don’t think there was any prayer.
Yes, in elementary school. I don’t remember much about junior high school, but I don’t think so. In high school, we had a ‘moment of silence’ that wasn’t SUPPOSED to be prayer, but whenever I tried reading during it, I got yelled out (hey, I was being silent, wtf?)
We also had “Religious Emphasis Week,” usually the three days of the week before Easter (we always had the Maundy Thursday and Good Friday off for Easter Break), which involved mandatory attendance at school-wide assemblies where we were continuously informed about the wonders of Christianity, and the jocks and cheerleaders and other popular school leaders would perform skits about being saved and how wonderful it was.
Never learned about anything other than Protestant Christianity (not Catholicism, for sure), and never learned or heard about any other religions, during those assemblies.
I didn’t meet or know of anyone not Christian until I went to college. It was a small S.C. mountain town, and I didn’t know enough to say “this? isn’t…legal, is it?” My mom now claims that if she’d known about it then, she’d have raised hell, but it’s not like it was a secret.
ETA: forgot to say when this was. late 70s for elementary/junior high, early 80s for high school, graduated high school in '84
Class of 2003. I once happened to be in the office during morning annoucments when one the regular student volunteers was absent. One of the secretaries asked if I wanted to do them and handed me the phone. I omitted “under God” from the pledge (which I never said at all in homeroom). When I was done she smiled and asked if a “forgot something” (I guess she assumed I was nervous). I told her no, she mentioned the pledge and I responded, very casually, “Because there isn’t one (god)”. She didn’t say anthing, but had kind of a shocked/disappointed look on her face that I would say such a thing.
Other than the moment of silence (which involved actual silence) there was no prayer or “God stuff” other than the pledge. Well after 9/11 we did get alot of “God Bless America” and on 9/11 itself our principal gave a very strange address over the intercom involve God and football. Health class included a bit about “spiritual health” being defined as “the ability to believe in some force”. I defined as the ablity to believe in “imaginaly friends” on a test, but annoyed the teacher into giving be credit.
I was very upset that I had to listen to a student-led prayer as part of my graduation. :mad: Nobody said anything about it in advance even though we had several full dress rehearsals of the entire ceremony which included every speaker reading their speech in full. I never had the chance to object (unless I wanted to start yelling in the middle of the ceremony) so I just abruptly sat as soon as my classmate mentioned God. I stood up again when she stopped.
No prayer, not even religion in my public elementary school, with the exception of learning about the Greek gods. No prayer in my public high school either, but there was a Christian Club that held prayers and Bible discussion after school. Due to school policy, the club sponsor, a teacher, was not allowed in the room while the club was in session. I think it was so that the school could say that it was not giving preference to any one religion.
There are public schools that have Good Friday off? The only kids I knew who ever got it off were the Catholic school kids.
OK, so I voted “Never,” but it’s true that at graduations they generally had an invocation or something by some local preacher–I guess they took turns? I think, anyway; I’m not at all sure that I’m remembering correctly. But I’m not sure that being present while someone prays in a sort of generic way counts as being obliged to pray myself.
The only other incident was in 6th grade, when a little girl in my school died–she was hit by a car during Open House night, and I remember the vice-principal running into the assembly and yelling “Is there a doctor in the house?” My teacher had a moment of silence for her and told us that if we wanted to, we could pray. We all sat there horribly embarrassed, because you don’t pray in school like that (from our 10yo perspective). I’m sure that 80% of the kids in the class went to church regularly and all, but openly–if silently–praying in school was right out.
I guess I should add that I went to school in California in the 80’s and graduated in '91.
Public school K-12. We had Good Friday off and fish appeared on the lunch menu alot during Lent.
Started elementary school in Virginia in the fall of 1960. There was prayer that first year, but not afterwards.
Are you counting the Pledge of Allegiance?
I voted “how could you leave out _____”, because although there weren’t usually regular prayer times at my school, but during elementary school we all had mandatory “Bible Class”. The class was once per week with the same church-lady type for all 6 years of elementary. There was no opting out of this class. 1970s, extremely rural Ohio.
Also, since the town was about 1/2 Catholic and apparently the Catholics were pretty strict about it, every Friday there would be fish for lunch in the cafeteria.
Public school, 1960s, I specifically remember one teacher leading us every morning in a prayer that we all recited along with her (3rd or 4th grade, most likely). There were probably others, but since we did this every day, it is the one example that remains with me.
Other: Not “nobody ever” and not “frequent” objections.
There were objections. They were not voiced to the teacher or administration.
When the Supremes decided forcing school kids to pray in US public schools was unconstitutional, my homeroom teacher flounced into the room and said, “Oh, we don’t care what the Supreme Court says, do we? WE are going to PRAY.”
And my heart sank. (Although it was algebra; prayer couldn’t have hurt.)
I also voted “how could you leave out”. While I was never compelled to pray in class, I did attend several “recognize the honor students” assemblies. As I recall, each had an invocation and/or benediction in which “God” or “Heavenly Father” was addressed in those terms, but there was never an overt command for those in attendance to pray – the wording was something like “let us now bow our heads in silence and respect”, and suggested that some lawyer had been consulted as to just how far the school system could go without risking a lawsuit.
I graduated in 1977 from a large public high school in northeast Ohio.
Back when I was in grade school – before the ban on school prayer in 1963 – New York State had an official state prayer that all public schoolchildren had to recite. It was specially designed to be as inoffensive as possible, and I still remember it:
“Our Father, we acknowledge our dependence on thee. We ask your blessing upon us, our parents, our teachers, and our country. Amen.”
Once the Supreme Court ruled against prayer in school (I was in third grade), it was dropped immediately, and replaced with a moment of silence. That slowly phased out.
In first grade (early 70s) I had a teacher who held prayer every morning. I remember hearing something about she wasn’t supposed to do that, but she did.
Treadwell Elementary in Memphis TN in the late seventies-early eighties.
Every single morning:
Pledge of Allegiance
Prayer
Bible story.
Patriotic song. One I remember strongly was God Bless America
I don’t think anyone complained. Nobody seemed to mind at all or if they did they kept quiet.
Public schools, Montgomery, Alabama, late 70’s through early 90’s.
Never. Not once.
We had it in second grade (1961-62) in our New York public school but not in first grade for some reason. Not sure if it was our teachers decision (or more likely) because of baby boom first grade was two shifts until they got another elementary school built. No one objected. I remember thinking it was a Catholic prayer (I was raised a Protestant) because on the first day of school, our teacher asked if anyone knew it and some kids said “Yes, we learned it in Catholic Sunday school.” Don’t remember anyone objecting. Still sort of remember how it goes but won’t try it here. When third grade started someone asked our teacher if we would be having prayer and she said no, the Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional.
Edit: looked it up. I remember saying “Father” instead of “God” but had it right otherwise. Amazed my older sister a few years ago when I did it, she had totally forgotten.