Wednesday, November 25th, 1998
School Law for Administration and Supervision: 0827.559
Brief submitted 25 November 1998
Citation:
Agostini v. Felton
United States Supreme Court
117 S.Ct. 1997, 138
Topic:
Establishment Clause of the First Amendment and how it affects the role of Title I.
Relief Sought:
To overrule the United States Supreme Court�s decision in Aquilar v. Felton, 473 U.S. 402 (1985).
Issue:
Can public school employees provide remedial education to students in parochial schools?
Facts:
Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, provides all educationally and economically disadvantaged children publicly funded remedial education services, regardless of whether they attend public or private schools. Until the Court’s decision in Aguilar (1985), many school systems provided these services to children attending religious schools. Public school teachers taught remedial education to the students at the private schools. The Court held that these practices violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment because they excessively entangled the public and religious school systems (Lemon Test). Hence, the practices violated the requirement that church and state remain separate.
Since Aguilar, the remedial education services are provided elsewhere. Some students are bussed to public schools or to leased sites. Others receive remediation in vans parked outside the schools. The decision in Aguilar has been criticized greatly because of how services being provided. In 1995, parents and the New York City Board of Education filed motions in the district court asking that the court recognize that Aguilar was no longer good law.
Findings of the US District Court:
The district court agreed to reconsider the case. It ruled that the landscape of Establishment Clause decisions has changed, but did not allow that Aquilar was totally ineffective.
Findings of the US Court of Appeals:
The Second Circuit affirmed the district court�s finding.
Findings of the US Supreme Court:
A federally funded program providing supplemental, remedial instruction to disadvantaged children on a neutral basis is not invalid under the Establishment Clause when such instruction is given on the premises of sectarian schools by government employees under a program containing safeguards such as those present in New York City’s Title I program. Thus, Aguilar is no longer good law.
Reasoning:
The Court first found that Rule 60(b) of the Federal Rule of Civil Procedure allowed the parties to bring this action to challenge the decision in Aguilar. After examining the rulings in Witters and Zobrest, in which a majority of the Justices expressed that the Aquilar decision should be overruled, the Court ruled that the decision in Aguilar was no longer good law. The Court rejected three presumptions it had previously relied on in deciding Establishment Clause cases:
- permitting public employees to work with religious schools results in state-sponsored religion
- permitting public employees to work with religious schools constitutes a symbolic union between church and state
- government aid that enhances the educational function of religious schools violates the separation between church and state.
Significance:
The Court has altered its approach to Establishment Clause cases. The Court’s approach now seems to focus on the actual effect of government programs-not the potential effect. If programs actually result in state-sponsored religion, they still will violate the First Amendment. Programs that create only the possibility, apparently will not.
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Monday, September 21st, 1998
Educational Organization and Leadership: 0828.546
Submitted 21 September 1998
My early years in school would be unremarkable to recount. I was a student who sat in class, listened to what my teacher said, and completed my homework nightly. Through this ritual, I learned how to follow directions precisely, earn good grades, and receive a pat on the head for being a good boy.
It was not until my final year of high school that I broke loose of this formality. It was almost through necessity. Having been such a good student early in my schooling, I was able to enroll at a fine preparatory school that promised a first class education. There I was no longer able to shine by sitting and listening and I struggled to solve the mystery of this new school. Yet, midway through my final year, sitting in English class, listening to my professor spew endlessly about the merits of Hamlet, I shattered the barricade by proclaiming, much to the shock of everyone present, that Hamlet was indeed an asshole.
Actually, the enlightenment came immediately following that remark when I was called to defend my statement. This was truly a first for me. I had interjected an original thought (no matter how crass it may have been) into a class discussion and now was asked my opinion, which I readily gave. Although my professor disagreed with my point of view, he congratulated me on a well-phrased defense. From then on, I found a comfortable way for me to learn: participate!
Throughout my undergraduate program as a philosophy student, I participated in my classes. By participating, I was engaged to the material we learned. Engagement is an active process and it is not for the light-hearted. I learned that positions need research and opinions can enrage. Through my development, I stumbled and that frustrated me. Yet, I knew I was better for it.
All of that and I scored as a sequential processor on the “Learning Combination Inventory” (Johnston, Christine A., and Gary R. Dainton. “Learning Combination Inventory.” 1997). Sequential and precise were the two processes in which I scored the highest with this tool and apparently, I avoid technical processing. Upon reviewing the questions, I think my responses are accurate, but I do not feel these scores represent me as a learner.
I, like all learners, rely on the combination of these processes. It is true my VCR clock blinks, yet I tear apart computer systems regularly. How technical am I really? It depends on what is being addressed. How sequential am I? An hour after teaching my nine-year old students all day, I probably am quite sequential. I like to think I am a diverse learner, one who can use many tools in which to seize a learning opportunity.
The Interactive Learning Model (Let Me Learn, www.letmelearn.org/concept.htm., 1998) supports a combination of processes: cognition, conation, and affectation. I ascribe high value to education, and even though I seek to engage in the process of it, I like to bear the grunt work (papers, projects, etc.) individually. I am precise with my words for I will red-line office memos as quickly as they are Xeroxed. My technical interest in a subject is dependent upon the value I ascribe to the material. Through it all, however, I seek to assemble what I am learning within my defined paradigm. The greater the discord with this paradigm, the greater the effort to capture the learning.
How I process all that is presented is just as much of a combination. The material defines the method, although as I grow older I find that I rely less upon the concrete and more upon the abstract. The paradigm is fragile (and essential) and it is too important not to be able to reconcile the new into what I know.
Posted in Bob, Education | No Comments »
