Catholic Schools Converted Into Charter Schools

This New York Times article published on Feb. 15, “Hurdles for a Plan to Turn Catholic Classrooms Into Charter Schools” ( http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/16/education/16charter.html?ref=nyregion ) raises many questions regarding the limits of religious influences in public education. The plans are for four Catholic schools to be converted into public charter schools due to lack of private funds. Although the schools are expected to open in the fall, there are several political, educational and legal issues associated with this transition.

First of all, there is the question of teaching religious-influenced material with the money of taxpayers, especially since these schools are expecting to keep most of the same teachers (although this may not be possible since the majority of them may not have the right qualifications by public school standards) as well as some of the same members of their organizing committees. Also, since the charter public school system in New York is based on a lottery, the children already enrolled in these Catholic schools will be given priority when the schools reopen as public charter schools, which means that the same Catholic parents will be the ones supporting these schools and the teachings and traditions that go along with Catholicism. For example, these schools did not teach health education like public schools – they did not include the part about sexual health because it went against their moral standards. However, as part of the public school system, they are required to comply with the teaching of this material. How will this be settled when the vast majority of parents don’t want their children to be exposed to this?

What I found interesting is that there is a law in place that bans private schools from becoming public charter schools. Why are parochial schools any different than private schools when it comes to sources of funding? If they allow these Catholic schools to become charter schools, they should also make this option available for non-religious private schools. From my understanding of this article, there are several Catholic private schools that have already been converted into charter schools in DC. Is that fair to the other private schools that may be lacking in funding during this economic crisis?

Of course, there are also very important, beneficial aspects of these parochial schools being used as charter schools rather than not being used at all, such as preventing other schools from becoming overcrowded. I think this is a very important reason for encouraging this transition. However, the transition process needs to be supervised very carefully so that religious ideologies don’t end up being taught in public schools.