The Freedom From Religion Foundation is asking a Northwest Ohio school district to stop letting a religious release time program operate on school property.
LifeWise Academy has been renting a room in Elmwood Local Schools’ Community Center during the school day since September 2022, according to a letter Freedom From Religion Foundation Staff Attorney Sammi Lawrence sent to Elmwood Schools Superintendent Tony Borton on Feb. 18.
“A concerned community member reports that the District is giving special treatment to LifeWise Academy, a religious release time program operating in the District. … It’s our understanding that the Community Center is owned and operated by the District. However, per the Community Center’s website, outside organizations are not allowed to rent rooms in the Center during school hours,” according to the letter.
LifeWise is a non-denominational Christian program that teaches the Bible to public school students during the school day at a special release time.
It is based in Hilliard and parents have said their students have been ostracized and bullied for not taking part in LifeWise.
“A public school violates the Constitution when it promotes religion by giving special access to school property to a religious release time program, including LifeWise,” Freedom From Religion Foundation said in their letter to Elmwood.
The United States Supreme Court upheld release time laws during the 1952 Zorach v. Clauson case, which allowed a school district to have students leave school for part of the day to receive religious instruction.
Religious release time instruction must meet three criteria: the courses must take place off school property, be privately funded, and students must have parental permission.
“LifeWise operates independently of the school district and is not part of the public school curriculum,” LifeWise said in a statement to the Ohio Capital Journal.
“Participation is voluntary and requires written parental consent. LifeWise rents space at the Community Center at a market rate under the same neutral access policies that apply to other community groups. The Community Center is a standalone facility owned by the district but made available for community use. Once a public entity opens a facility for broad public use, it cannot exclude religious organizations solely because they are religious.”
Elmwood Schools, which enrolls about 1,300 students, did not respond to questions from the Ohio Capital Journal.
A law went into effect last year that requires Ohio school districts to have a religious release time policy, which has helped pave the way for LifeWise Academy to grow. Previously, the law merely permitted districts to have a religious release time policy.
LifeWise is operating in more than 260 of the Ohio’s 607 districts. The nonprofit plans to be in about 300 school districts across the state by the end of the school year.
“The District’s decision to give LifeWise special treatment inappropriately and needlessly alienates students and families who practice minority religions or no religion at all,” Freedom From Religion Foundation wrote in their letter.
“By allowing LifeWise to operate on school property, the District is sending a clear message that it not only favors religion over nonreligion, but also Christianity over all other faiths.”
A little less than a third of U.S. adults are religiously unaffiliated, according to a 2023-24 Pew Research Center survey.
Freedom From Religion Foundation receives complaints related to LifeWise a handful of times throughout the year and most of those complaints come from Ohio, Lawrence said.
“The complaints can vary a lot from schools inappropriately advertising LifeWise or giving LifeWise special treatment in other ways,” she said.
“Sometimes that does include school districts letting LifeWise operate on school property or cutting LifeWise some kind of special rental deal.”
Originally published by the Ohio Capital Journal. Republished here with permission.