Pennsylvania Schools and Lifewise Academy Ignore State Law
Pine-Richland Schools and Lifewise Academy allow parents to ignore state law and local board policy.
Pennsylvania state law requires parents to submit a statement to the district after each Lifewise Academy class their child attends. Public records requests sent to two districts where Lifewise Academy operates indicate that this law is not being followed. Sto-Rox (McKees Rocks, PA) and Pine-Richland (Gibsonia, PA) School Districts both replied that the records from parents to the district did not exist. Pine-Richland refused to fulfill the request on the grounds of student privacy.
The Law
Pennsylvania state law and the local board of education policies require parents to send statements to the district after every child’s absence.
“and that the parent or person in loco parentis shall, following each such absence, furnish in writing to the superintendent of the school district a statement attesting that the child did in fact attend the instruction and the dates and hours upon which such attendance took place.”
Section 1546 of the Pennsylvania School Code
”c. Following each absence, the person in parental relation shall submit a statement attesting that the student attended the instruction, and the dates and hours of attendance.”
Pine-Richland Board of Education Policy 204 - Attendance
The original records request was very clear that no personal information should be visible in the records.
“Please redact all personally identifiable information. Although not required under the Right to Know laws, the purpose of this request is to confirm compliance with the school board policy.”
Respect Public Schools (RPS) filed an appeal with the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records. The district issued a statement asserting that the records do not exist.
The school district explained the lack of records. Because Lifewise Academy checks the child in and out, the district knows when the child attended, and the legal requirements are satisfied. The district interprets the law to mean that if it knows when the child left and returned to school, the law is satisfied. RPS believes this is an excuse to cover up noncompliance with state law.
The Pine-Richland district initially stated that the records could not be released. After an appeal was filed, the district provided a signed statement asserting that the records could not be provided because they do not exist. The district's handling of this request suggests an intent to conceal that the law was not being followed. If the district believed the law was being followed and that the records did not exist, it would have been easy to state this from the outset.
Parents’ Rights, Without Parent Involvement?
The concept of released time religious instruction has been described as a parents’ rights issue. The district will excuse a student “upon the written request of a parent or other person in loco parentis.” Parents are required to authorize enrollment, and the same language indicates that they must send a statement after each class. The state has put the parents in charge of validating the students’ attendance. Not the religious program.
The Pennsylvania Catholic Conference (12982) indicated that requiring parents to submit their own statements to the school “may prove less than satisfactory in that some parents may fail to provide the necessary assurance of attendance.” (page 8) School districts are clearly supporting a religious entity in its violation of state law. Lifewise Academy has repeatedly shown that it does not understand or follow all laws and school policies. School districts follow hundreds of policies and thousands of laws. Lifewise has a few paragraphs of state law and school policy to comply with, yet it routinely fails to comply with them correctly.
School districts are allowing laws to be ignored. Lifewise is operating a program that is not in compliance with state law. A school district stating that records can’t be released, but then claiming the records never existed. Released-time religious instruction consistently attracts the worst decisions from those who support it.