NY’s power to regulate religious schools trimmed by judge
Parents cannot be required to pull their children from private schools in New York that fail to meet state-designated standards, a judge decided, striking down a key provision of rules recently passed to strengthen oversight of such schools, including those specializing in religious education.
The ruling in a state trial court in Albany came in response to a lawsuit brought by ultra-Orthodox Jewish schools, called yeshivas, and related advocacy groups over education rules enacted last fall. Under the rules, the state’s 1,800 private and religious schools must provide an education that is “substantially equivalent” to that of a public school.
Opponents in the ultra-Orthodox community say the rules improperly target yeshivas, some of which focus intently on religious instruction with far less teaching in secular subjects such as English, math and science.