A Catholic Public Charter School?
If you’ve spent any meaningful time in the world of public charter schools, or public education in general, you’ve probably heard it more than once:
“Aren’t charter schools basically private schools operating with public money?”
And if you’re a charter school leader as I am, you’ve probably spent a lot of time trying to set the record straight: charter schools are public schools. We are tuition-free. We follow state standards. We take all comers. And we are accountable to the public, both financially and academically.
But recent headlines like the U.S. Supreme Court’s 4–4 split on the Oklahoma Catholic charter school case make this task harder, not easier.
Let’s unpack the legal battle, explore the implications, and I’ll share what this means from my seat as a longtime California charter school leader.
The Oklahoma Experiment: St. Isidore of Seville
Last year, Oklahoma became the first state to approve a religious charter school for public funding: St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School. It was sponsored by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and explicitly designed to offer a Catholic education, funded with taxpayer dollars.
That move immediately triggered legal alarms. Oklahoma’s own Republican Attorney General Drummond filed suit to block it. The state’s Supreme Court agreed, ruling 6–2 that allowing St. Isidore to operate as a religious charter school would violate both the state constitution and the federal Establishment Clause.
“This decision is a tremendous victory for religious liberty,” Drummond said in a statement. “The framers of the U.S. Constitution and those who drafted Oklahoma’s Constitution clearly understood how best to protect religious freedom: by preventing the State from sponsoring any religion at all. Now Oklahomans can be assured that our tax dollars will not fund the teachings of Sharia Law or even Satanism.”
That decision was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, where a 4–4 deadlock (after Justice Amy Coney Barrett recused herself) let the Oklahoma decision stand, at least for now.
The Legal Questions: Free Exercise vs. Establishment
This case, formally titled Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board v. Drummond, sits at the intersection of two Constitutional tensions:
The Free Exercise Clause, which prohibits the government from discriminating against religion.
The Establishment Clause, which prohibits the government from endorsing or advancing religion.
The school’s backers cited prior Supreme Court decisions as support. In Espinoza v. Montana (2020), the Court held that if a state provides tuition assistance to private schools, it cannot exclude religious ones simply because of their faith. Similarly, in Carson v. Makin (2022), the Court ruled that Maine could not exclude religious schools from a public tuition program.
But there’s a critical distinction here: those cases dealt with private schools receiving indirect funding. St. Isidore is a charter school, which is public, and that's a fundamentally different legal and practical question.
The Oklahoma justices emphasized that difference:
“Charter schools are public schools. A religious public school is an oxymoron.”
— Oklahoma Supreme Court Ruling
That quote resonated with me. Not because it simplifies a complex issue, but because it echoes what many of us have been trying to clarify for years.
The Messaging Mess: “Private School Education at a Public School Price”
When I first started as a charter school principal 19 years ago, a well-intentioned colleague began using a marketing slogan for our school:
“A private school education at a public school price.”
While catchy, this line reinforced a misperception, namely that charter schools aren’t really public. That they cherry-pick students, or function more like boutique educational enclaves than part of the public system.
We soon dropped the slogan.
The misperception persists to this day, however. And now, with cases like St. Isidore, they gain new fuel. If charter schools can be religious, then what aren’t they? How can we convincingly argue that we are public, secular, inclusive institutions, if one of us is allowed to catechize with state funds?
To be clear, I support religious education on principle and in practice. Faith-based schools are a vital part of the American educational landscape. I have no issue with Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, or any other religious schools doing what they do.
But when you’re taking public money, there must be bright lines. And that line has always been: no religious instruction.
Arguments In Favor of Religious Charter Schools
Proponents argue that excluding religious organizations from charter programs is discrimination in itself. They lean on the Free Exercise Clause and cite Espinoza and Carson as proof that religious organizations can’t be denied public benefits solely due to their faith.
Here’s how Brett Farley, Executive Director of the Catholic Conference of Oklahoma, put it:
“Religious discrimination is still discrimination. If religious organizations meet academic and operational standards, they should not be excluded.”
— The Guardian
That argument gains traction among school choice advocates, who want to broaden educational options through vouchers, education savings accounts, and now, religious charters.
Arguments Opposed to Religious Charter Schools
Opponents, including the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, argue that charter schools are public by definition—and therefore must remain nonsectarian.
The Oklahoma ruling noted that allowing religious charters would “eviscerate” the wall between church and state, setting a dangerous precedent for state-funded religious instruction.
From a policy perspective, it opens the floodgates: if one religious charter is allowed, any and all must be, regardless of doctrine or practice. It could entangle public education in sectarian disputes and dilute the core purpose of public schooling: a unifying, secular experience available to all.
What’s Next?
The US Supreme Court’s split means the issue is far from resolved. Another case, perhaps with a full bench, could soon bring religious charters back to the national stage. States like Florida, Arizona, and Texas are already exploring similar proposals.
But for those of us in the trenches, leading public charter schools with diverse students and complex missions, the legal wrangling has real-world consequences. It confuses the public. It muddies our message. And it adds fire to the persistent, ill-informed belief that we’re something other than fully public schools.
My Perspective
I’ve been in public charter school education for over 30 years. I’ve seen charter schools transform communities, empower families, and innovate in inspiring ways. But I’ve also seen how fragile our legitimacy can be, how misunderstood charter schools are despite having been around for a third of a century. We survive and thrive because the public trusts us to be public, open to all, secular in curriculum. Once that trust erodes, our foundation crumbles.
Religious charter schools, even if well-intentioned, blur the line too far. They don’t help our cause; they compromise it.
Let’s keep religious instruction where it belongs: in private institutions funded by families or faith-based organizations. And let’s protect public charter schools for what they are and must remain: inclusive, accountable, and public.
I wrote the first draft of this post while on a recent trip to Peru. Sitting in an outdoor cafe at the base of Machu Picchu, I looked across the narrow street and noticed a school. The campus walls were decorated with puffy clouds, teddy bears, flowers and cartoon children playing on a slide. There was even a monkey swinging from the school’s seal. And above the monkey, emerging from behind an electrical box, the Virgen del Carmen floated against a backdrop of Andean peaks. I looked up the school: it’s public and serves preschool and kindergarten.
Not one to believe in omens, I did nonetheless pause and ask myself if in the near future this is how the entrance to a US public school might look?
