Leadership Focus
When students at Underwood Elementary School walk to their classrooms on Monday, there will be no witches, warlocks, or even SpongeBob SquarePants there to greet them.
No skeleton paintings or Frankenstein tattoos, either.
The school's principal said yesterday he acceded to the complaints of a handful of parents who said that because the school's traditional Halloween celebrations offended their religious beliefs, they would not send their children to school if the revelry continued this year.
''Not everyone is going to agree with the decision, and I really understand that," said principal David Castelline. ''But I felt the goal was really important to make it a respectful and open and welcoming place for all members of our community."
Castelline, who met yesterday with the Parent Teacher Organization to explain his decision, said three teachers told him they had children in their classes who were not going to come to school if the Halloween celebration was held. The celebration, which has been going on for at least 14 years, involves teachers dressing up and lining the hallways and children making Halloween-related arts and crafts.
''When I hear that kids won't come to school because of what we're doing on Halloween, I have a problem with that," Castelline said.
Several parents who did not support the decision to cancel the celebration said they are considering staging a protest by donning costumes on Monday and standing in front of the school.
''If they can cancel Halloween, what about Columbus Day and Valentines Day? We get Jewish holidays and Christmas off, so what's next?" asked Andrea Newman, whose two sons attend the school. ''All it takes is one person to be offended, and our school will ban it."
Castelline said the school instead planned to hold a ''celebration of fall" next Friday. Later in the year, he said, the school plans a costume celebration in which teachers and perhaps students will be encouraged to dress as their favorite literary characters.
According to the state Department of Education, no one in Massachusetts is tracking Halloween school celebrations, so it is difficult to track how many schools forgo the holiday.
Joel Packer, spokesman for the National Education Association, said the controversy is part of a contentious nationwide trend in which schools are trying to shorten or cancel holiday celebrations, either for religious reasons or to put more time into classroom work. Halloween is one of the few holidays that can fall when children are in school, he said, which puts school districts more on the spot.
Packer also mentioned that Halloween was causing trouble in the courts for schools as well.
Turning the tables on church-state separationists, the religious right has filed a series of lawsuits claiming that various public school districts have violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by promoting witchcraft--which they refer to as the religion of "Wicca"--during Halloween.
How? By teaching witchcraft, requiring students to recite "Satanic chants," and sponsoring Halloween celebrations.
Halloween has already come under fire in government facility for violation of the First Amendment. In Rivera-Alicea v. Gonzalez-Galoffin, a secretary in Puerto Rico's Department of Justice claims that she was retaliated against for complaining that "pagan" office Halloween decorations offended her Pentecostal Christian religious belief, and violated both the Expression and Establishment clauses of the First Amendment.
And in Brown v. Woodland Joint Unified School District, fundamentalist parents--supported by the American Family Association--sued a California school district alleging that use of the Impressions Reading Series in elementary school compelled their children "to practice the 'religion' of witchcraft in violation of the federal Establishment Clause."
Douglas E. Brown and Katherine E. Brown, parents of two students and members of the Christian Assembly of God denomination, objected to the use of portions of Impressions, a teaching aid, in the first through sixth grades in the Woodland Joint Unified School District
Impressions is a series of 59 books containing approximately 10,000 literary selections and classroom activities. The selections were chosen to reflect a broad range of North American cultures and traditions. Several of the selections discuss "the folklore of diverse cultures," including "charms, spells, wizards, and witches," and some of the associated learning activities have students "role-play sorcerers and witches and cast spells." The parents claimed that, because the challenged selections "engage children in witchcraft rituals and cause them to pretend that they are witchcraft practitioners," the Impressions curriculum endorses and promotes Wicca.
What's worse, the parents argued, exposing their children to "witchcraft rituals" could lead to their involvement in demonic sects later in life.
A similar challenge to the use of Impressions was filed in Illinois.
The plaintiffs/parents in Fleischfresser v. Directors of School District 200 claimed that the reading series promotes "religious concepts found in paganism and branches of witchcraft and Satanism" and requires students "to prepare and cast chants and spells and to practice being witches."
As in Brown, the parents in Fleischfresser also claim that use of Impressions violates the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment by "indoctrinating children in values directly opposed to their Christian beliefs by teaching tricks, despair, deceit, parental disrespect, and by denigrating Christian symbols and holidays."
After parental complaints, both School Districts appointed special committees to review Impressions for any emphasis on witchcraft or the occult. Both committees decided that was not enough evidence to establish a connection between Impressions and occult practices, and did not recommend excluding the 32 disputed selections.
The question before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals was: do the classroom activities in a public school district require children to practice the "religion" of witchcraft in violation of the Establishment Clause of the US Constitution?
The Browns argued that the selections violated the second prong of the Lemon Test, which prohibits any government activity which has the primary effect of advancing or hindering religion - whether intentional or not, and even if those effects are secondary effects of government acts. According to the Browns, that is what happened when children read about witchcraft and are asked to act out scenes from such stories.
And what about school sponsorship of Halloween celebrations like the one in Massachusetts?
The NEA was named as a defendant in a Federal, class-action lawsuit seeking to enjoin Halloween celebrations in both Arkansas and Florida public schools.
The plaintiffs in Guyer v. School Board of Alachua County complained that the "depiction of witches, cauldrons, and brooms" in Halloween decorations placed in the county's public elementary schools, as well as the practice of "teachers dressing up as witches in black dresses and pointed hats" on October 31 each year, endorsed and promoted the religion of Wicca in violation of the Establishment Clause.
Wilhelmina Ripple --author of several holiday books, including ''Halloween School Parties: What Do I Do?" --said school districts nationwide are changing the name of parties to make the celebrations more palatable for those who want to avoid having school-endorsed ghouls and goblins.
Parents of Underwood Elementary students said they didn't mind not being able to celebrate the holiday, but they complained that it was political correctness run amok, particularly at a school where one-fifth of the student body is nonwhite and the website is in both English and Chinese.
''The beauty of having diversity is to celebrate different cultures and holidays," said Renee Levin.
''It's not good," said her 7-year-old son, Jake, who is planning to dress up as a Ninja and go trick-or-treating after school. ''Last year we got a Halloween party and it was really fun."