Religious Schools

Hands popped up as Monsignor G. Michael Schleupner asked a class of second-graders for facts about Martin Luther King Jr. "He gave a speech called `I Have A Dream,' " said one child. "He went to jail," said another. Schleupner agreed. "Martin Luther King Jr. was doing things that made people uncomfortable, and he was put in jail," said Schleupner, who has been a pastor of St. Margaret's Church in Bel Air for the past year. Schleupner's recent discussion on the civil rights leader at St. Margaret's Elementary School in Bel Air is an example of many initiatives the school offers, officials said.

No tax credit boost for private schools A strong democracy depends on a good system of public education. Maryland's constitution requires that every child be provided an adequate education in free public schools. That is why we take issue with the Baltimore Sun editorial supporting the BOAST (Building Opportunities for All Students and Teachers) bill ("A win-win idea," March 22). Reducing the state's general fund by giving tax credits to businesses that donate to private and religious schools isn't good state policy in good economic times.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court, angrily divided over how it should use its power, reached out yesterday to overrule two long-settled decisions and gave the government sweeping authority to subsidize education in parochial schools.Splitting 5-4, the court ruled that, contrary to what it decided 12 years ago, the Constitution allows public school teachers to be paid with public funds to enter parochial schools and offer remedial studies, guidance counseling and enrichment classes.The Constitution's clauses separating church and government, the court majority said, do not bar publicly paid teachers from the classrooms of parochial schools, so long as they teach subjects other than religion.

Hands popped up as Monsignor G. Michael Schleupner asked a class of second-graders for facts about Martin Luther King Jr. "He gave a speech called `I Have A Dream,' " said one child. "He went to jail," said another. Schleupner agreed. "Martin Luther King Jr. was doing things that made people uncomfortable, and he was put in jail," said Schleupner, who has been a pastor of St. Margaret's Church in Bel Air for the past year. Schleupner's recent discussion on the civil rights leader at St. Margaret's Elementary School in Bel Air is an example of many initiatives the school offers, officials said.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court, splitting 5-3, ruled that students at deeply religious schools are allowed by the Constitution to get some government benefits -- even if it means that public funds are used to convey one faith's beliefs.By significantly relaxing the ban that has existed on using government-paid staff members to help students at many parochial schools, the court appeared to be moving further to allow closer ties between government and religion.Coupled with recent actions allowing religious groups to meet at public schools to discuss their faith and allowing students to lead prayers at public school graduations, the new action signaled the court's widening tolerance for religion as a facet of public life.

Small towns in Maine that do not have their own public high schools routinely cover the costs for their children to attend private schools or public schools in neighboring districts.But three families in Minot, a town of 1,664 people in southwestern Maine, wanted the town to pay their children's tuition at a Roman Catholic school.This week, in the most recent of several rulings on the use of vouchers for religious schools, a federal judge ruled against them."The plaintiffs certainly are free to send their children to a sectarian school.

WASHINGTON - The contentious issue of school vouchers landed squarely before the Supreme Court yesterday as the justices weighed whether a Cleveland program that uses public money to send thousands of students to private religious schools violates the First Amendment separation of church and state. The issue could turn on how much of a choice the court determines Cleveland parents really have under the Ohio program. Opponents argue that virtually the only options for parents are to keep their children in the public system or enroll them in church-sponsored schools.

THE CAP ON the upper-case J is back. That's a good thing. Opinion about the cursive capital Q is mixed, but no one likes the simplified upper-case M. It's Thursday noon at the National Catholic Educational Association convention, and a group of teachers from St. John the Evangelist School in northern Baltimore County is discussing arcane details of handwriting over Caesar salad at a downtown hotel. These teachers prove that handwriting lives, despite the computer juggernaut. Two children from their school have won Maryland championships this spring in the National Handwriting Contest.

In an article in Thursday's editions of The Sun, the position of the Baltimore area's Jewish community regarding proposed state aid to private and religious schools was not clearly stated. Although several rabbis have expressed support for the proposal, the Baltimore Jewish Council is opposed to goverment aid for nonpublic schools.Pub Date: 12/23/97

No tax credit boost for private schools A strong democracy depends on a good system of public education. Maryland's constitution requires that every child be provided an adequate education in free public schools. That is why we take issue with the Baltimore Sun editorial supporting the BOAST (Building Opportunities for All Students and Teachers) bill ("A win-win idea," March 22). Reducing the state's general fund by giving tax credits to businesses that donate to private and religious schools isn't good state policy in good economic times.

Jewish educators around Baltimore are studying an unusual topic this year: God. Teachers often shy away from discussions of God or defining beliefs at Jewish day schools and supplemental classes offered by congregations, said Lawrence M. Ziffer, the executive vice president of the Center for Jewish Education in Park Heights. "Most other religions have a lot of God talk," Ziffer said. In Judaism, however, "that almost never happens on a communal level." Instead, religious education usually covers areas such as holidays, rituals and liturgical or modern Hebrew.

. Cody Young is an evangelical Christian who attends a religious high school in Southern California. With stellar grades, competitive test scores and an impressive list of extracurricular activities, Young has mapped a future that includes studying engineering at the University of California and a career in the aerospace industry, his lawyers have said. But Young, his teachers and his family fear his beliefs may hurt his chance to attend the university. They say the public university system, which has 10 campuses, discriminates against students from evangelical Christian schools, especially faith-based ones like Calvary Chapel Christian School in Murrieta, where Young is a senior.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan - In a major injection of new aid, the United States is donating $100 million over five years to Pakistan's troubled education system, including its religious schools, even though those schools, called madrassas, have been accused of breeding Islamic extremism. A program administered by the U.S. Agency for International Development has been geared to focus on training teachers, reforming curriculums and assisting in the formation of programs in which corporations "adopt" schools.

The U.S. Supreme Court narrowly endorsed school vouchers yesterday, upholding a Cleveland program that provides grants to low-income parents to help pay for their children's enrollment in parochial schools. The court ruled 5-4 that the Ohio voucher law does not violate the Constitution's ban on state sponsorship of religion because it mandates that students have a choice between private academies, church-run schools or public schools that perform better. The decision could foster major changes in public education.

WASHINGTON - The contentious issue of school vouchers landed squarely before the Supreme Court yesterday as the justices weighed whether a Cleveland program that uses public money to send thousands of students to private religious schools violates the First Amendment separation of church and state. The issue could turn on how much of a choice the court determines Cleveland parents really have under the Ohio program. Opponents argue that virtually the only options for parents are to keep their children in the public system or enroll them in church-sponsored schools.

Gov. Parris N. Glendening plans to propose another round of state aid for Maryland's private and religious schools in next year's budget, reopening one of this year's most emotional legislative debates. A spokesman for Glendening confirmed that the governor intends to include more than $6 million to help nonpublic schools buy textbooks in his budget proposal for next year, a "slight increase" over the subsidy the General Assembly approved for the first time this year. "He thinks that this program increases the education of all of Maryland's students, including those who don't take advantage of public schools," said Michael Morrill, Glendening's communications director.

The Miami Herald said in an editorial Friday:THE Supreme Court did no favor for state legislators by ducking the issue of school vouchers that may be cashed at religious schools. The political struggle over vouchers needs clear thinking and legal guidance from the court.The issue most likely will confront Florida's legislators in the spring.Despite the obvious First Amendment issues posed by the flow of public money into religious schools via vouchers, only Justice Stephen Breyer voted to review the issues raised by Wisconsin's voucher program.

With the Maryland treasury flush with cash, Gov. Parris N. Glendening is considering sending state aid for the first time to private and religious schools for computers and books, a spokesman said yesterday.Although the governor has not made a final decision, he has sent signals to people interested in the issue that he is leaning toward what would be a significant change in state policy.Such a move would likely ignite a debate on state government's proper role in assisting private and religious schools.

Traffic and religion might seem like strange bedfellows, but in Savage they are at the heart of a growing struggle between a church and a community. Bethel Assembly Church of God asked Howard County for permission early this year to change the zoning for one of its school buildings that was under construction. The zoning change would allow more students, and to neighborhood residents that would mean more traffic congestion on the heavily traveled Savage-Guilford Road. The unfinished building sits empty in the 9000 block of Vollmerhausen Road but is zoned for up to 100 high school students.