The Freedom From Religion Foundation has successfully ensured that young children will be free from future religious art assignments in the Gosnell School District, Ark.
A concerned community parent informed the state/church watchdog that an art teacher who teaches kindergarten through sixth grade at Gosnell Elementary School had students paint the crucifixion scene for Easter. GES’s art show from May 24, 2024, proves this claim, showing some of the crucifixion paintings. This is reportedly also not the first year that the assignment has been given to students. These drawings were prominently displayed on the elementary school walls.
“If the District turns a blind eye to overt proselytization in its classroom, it becomes complicit in an egregious constitutional violation and breach of trust,” FFRF Patrick O’Reiley Legal Fellow Hirsh M. Joshi wrote to the district.
Public school students have a constitutional right to be free from religious indoctrination in their public schools. It is well settled that public schools may not show favoritism toward or coerce belief or participation in religion. Moreover, public schools may not provide religious instruction. There is simply no legitimate educational reason to assign any public school student to depict the Christian cross in their artwork. By including such pervasively sectarian assignments, the district abdicates its constitutional duty to remain neutral toward religion, which needlessly excludes and alienates the 49 percent of Generation Z students who are religiously unaffiliated and clearly is an attempt to proselytize.
The district took this opportunity to learn from its mistake. FFRF received a letter from the District Legal Counsel Phillip M. Brick, Jr., who wrote that, “to avoid any ongoing issues, the district art teacher will not assign a project that includes drawing a crucifix in the future.”
“School districts are for education, not indoctrination into religion,” FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor says. “Students do not need to show their devotion to a teacher’s god in order to get a good grade.”
The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a national nonprofit organization with over 40,000 members and several chapters across the country, including hundreds of members and the Ozarks Chapter in Arkansas. Our purposes are to protect the constitutional principle of separation between state and church, and to educate the public on matters relating to nontheism.
