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It's about time that Christians started fighting back.
Faith-Based Community Service Rejected At High School; Student Sues Claiming Policy is Unconstitutional
by Fox and Friends Posted in: Community Service, First Amendment, Freedom of Religion, Unconstitutional
Student Sues School Over Community Service
A Thomas Jefferson high school student in Virginia is back on the National Honor Society after suing the school district for refusing to give her credit for community service. Why was she removed and her service rejected in the first place? Sarah Stites said she was denied credit for her work because she completed it at her church, which goes against her school’s policy mandating that volunteer work must have a secular purpose and may not include religious services.
While she has since been given credit, she is not dropping the lawsuit claiming the school’s policy is unconstitutional. Stites said she would like them to change the rules so that kids like her “now and in the future can have faith-based community service fully recognized.”
Stites believes that “Community service is community service, no matter where it’s done. I think that as long as it’s at a nonprofit organization it should be recognized because I know that most of what I do in Sunday school is what any preschool teacher would do, beyond teaching the kids biblical values.”
Stites said that the National Honor Society accepts faith-based community service, but it’s her school district that denied it. A spokesman for the Virginia school district said in a statement, “It was an honest mistake. There was nothing sinister about it. Everything is under review right now.” Stites doesn’t believe them because she said in her communications with the district, “it was clear that it was not a mistake.”
Attorney Jordan Lorence, from the Alliance Defense Fund that is proceeding with the lawsuit, weighed in saying that they’re suing based on the First Amendment and free exercise of religion. He said the way the policy is currently written is problematic and needs to be changed, calling it unconstitutional.
Faith-Based Community Service Rejected At High School; Student Sues Claiming Policy is Unconstitutional
by Fox and Friends Posted in: Community Service, First Amendment, Freedom of Religion, Unconstitutional
Student Sues School Over Community Service
A Thomas Jefferson high school student in Virginia is back on the National Honor Society after suing the school district for refusing to give her credit for community service. Why was she removed and her service rejected in the first place? Sarah Stites said she was denied credit for her work because she completed it at her church, which goes against her school’s policy mandating that volunteer work must have a secular purpose and may not include religious services.
While she has since been given credit, she is not dropping the lawsuit claiming the school’s policy is unconstitutional. Stites said she would like them to change the rules so that kids like her “now and in the future can have faith-based community service fully recognized.”
Stites believes that “Community service is community service, no matter where it’s done. I think that as long as it’s at a nonprofit organization it should be recognized because I know that most of what I do in Sunday school is what any preschool teacher would do, beyond teaching the kids biblical values.”
Stites said that the National Honor Society accepts faith-based community service, but it’s her school district that denied it. A spokesman for the Virginia school district said in a statement, “It was an honest mistake. There was nothing sinister about it. Everything is under review right now.” Stites doesn’t believe them because she said in her communications with the district, “it was clear that it was not a mistake.”
Attorney Jordan Lorence, from the Alliance Defense Fund that is proceeding with the lawsuit, weighed in saying that they’re suing based on the First Amendment and free exercise of religion. He said the way the policy is currently written is problematic and needs to be changed, calling it unconstitutional.
Thanks for clarifying that for me.
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