Ohio lawmakers weigh religious release time legislation

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) -- Some groups are pushing to let students take religious courses during the school day and two bills at the Ohio Statehouse could make it mandatory for public schools to give students the option of having “released time.”    

“Released time,” as currently defined in state law, means “a period of time during which a student is excused from school to attend a course in religious instruction conducted by a private entity off school district property.”    

Currently, the law says a “school district board of education may adopt a policy.” The legislation changes “may” to “shall.”  

The legislation has brought out more than 100 supporters to the Ohio Statehouse, and dozens of opponents, though in-person testimony was limited to three people on each side.    

Parents like Jaclyn Fraley, who has a first grader, said she first heard about the program at the park with her daughter.    

“A mother asked what school she was going to, and I mentioned her school, and the mother said, ‘Oh, are you going to be having her attend LifeWise,’” Fraley said.    

LifeWise Academy is one of the main proponents of the legislation. LifeWise is a Christian-based released time program that asserts things like “the rise of science” as being a reason religion is no longer taught in public schools. It also pushes the idea that the removal of religious classes in public schools has led to negative consequences.  

Back in June, LifeWise CEO Joel Penton said he has heard from parents all over the state who want this option.     

Parents like Fraley said LifeWise is very prevalent, and her family is not Christian, so her research left her with more questions than answers. 

“It automatically led me down the path of ‘No, she won't be going,’” she said. “But then it also turned me into what, ‘What, what is this? And how has this become so involved in our schools? And also, how would this affect my child not going?’”    

Fraley said she worries about her daughter being singled out or feeling pressured and not understanding why. 

“She would just know, at six years old, that she can't go and hang out with her friends,” Fraley said.  

Supporters of the legislation, like Ohio Rep. Josh Williams (R-Sylvania), pushed back on that idea.

“I was a student that did comply with school rules and wasn't able to go to a field trip and I would be the only (student) left behind that. It happens all the time,” Williams said. “You can come up with creative policies to make sure students don't feel left out and I think it's just up to the individual school districts to be creative about making sure kids aren't bullied because they're not going to these programs.”  

He said schools can come up with several things for students who don’t participate to do like get extra time to study with a teacher or tutor, have learning recovery time, or have students participate in their released time during lunch. 

Williams pointed out that this cannot interfere with the core curriculum, but said still, schools can have a say if they want more restrictions since the legislation has no guidelines. 

“Schools can come up with a myriad of policies,” he said. “They could say that a particular class is not allowed to participate in this released time if their scores are below a certain level. You can require the organizations to pass background checks. You can require them to assume liability. Require them to only have two days out of the year be released. You can have so many requirements in your policy.”    

Williams said it is “absurd” that school districts are not required to have any policy at all right now.    

“All we're saying is, ‘School board, sit down and come up with some policy so these organizations can try to comply,’” he said. “That's it.”    

Fraley said that as a parent, she trusts her elected school board to make decisions, and if her school board does not want a religious released time policy, they should not be required to have one. Plus, if this passed, she said it will stretch school boards too thin.   

“It's a burden to put on the school district, so they’re going to have to be able to set these parameters and then they're constantly going to have to be fighting,” she said.
 “It’s going to put a lot of work and burden on those school districts to maintain the parameters around it, maintain the compliance around these programs, make sure that everyone is a good actor in this process.”
 

Fraley said her biggest concern about this legislation right now is that it is attached to a bigger bill, forcing some lawmakers’ hands to vote in favor of it.    

Chairperson of the Ohio House Primary and Secondary Education Committee Rep. Gayle Manning (R-North Ridgeville) said there will likely be no hearing or vote on the bill this or next week, but she will be gauging her committee members’ positions on it.   

“I will have conversations with each committee member separately and find out where they are on this,” she said.