Steirer v. Bethlehem Area School District

789 F. Supp. 1337, 1992 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 4148, 1992 WL 82971
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Pennsylvania
DecidedApril 2, 1992
DocketCiv. A. 90-6046
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 789 F. Supp. 1337 (Steirer v. Bethlehem Area School District) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Steirer v. Bethlehem Area School District, 789 F. Supp. 1337, 1992 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 4148, 1992 WL 82971 (E.D. Pa. 1992).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM & ORDER

HUYETT, District Judge.

This action arises as a result of the adoption by the Bethlehem Area School District of a revised program of high school studies which includes a community service graduation requirement. Plaintiffs, Barbara Steirer and Thomas Steirer, individually and as parents and guardians of Lynn Ann Steirer, and Thomas Moralis and Barbara Moralis, individually and as parents and guardians of David Stephen Moralis, bring this action against defendants Bethlehem Area School District, Thomas J. Dolusio, Ellen Pagano, Barbara Huth, Joseph McCarthy, John Spirk, Sr., Ruth Prosser, Uriel Trujillo, Lawrence Kisslinger, Lynn Glancy and Robert Thompson. Plaintiffs claim that the community service program and graduation requirement adopted by the Bethlehem Area School District violates the First, Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendment rights of the minor plaintiffs and of all students attending Bethlehem Area schools. Both plaintiffs and defendants have filed motions for summary judgment pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 56. For the reasons stated below, I shall grant defendants’ motion for summary judgment and deny plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment.

I. INTRODUCTION.

On April 30, 1990, the Bethlehem Area School District (“school district”), by a majority vote of its Board of Directors, adopted a program of high school studies which includes a community service graduation requirement. The program requires that every student in the school district provide sixty (60) hours of community service between the start of ninth grade and the completion of twelfth grade. 1 The required community service can be provided through an agency approved by the school district, through an independent program selected by the district or through an independent program selected by the student *1339 and approved by the appropriate school officials.

The plaintiffs in this action are two sets of parents who reside within the school district and their two children, each of whom attends a public high school operated by the school district. The defendants are the school district, members of the school district’s board of directors, and the school district superintendent. The school district is located in Lehigh County and Northampton County and covers approximately forty-two square miles. The school district serves a population of approximately 100,-000 and enrollment in all age groups is approximately 12,000. Approximately 3,500 students are enrolled in high schools in the school district.

Under the program adopted by the Bethlehem Area School District, any community service project must meet the course objectives outlined in the curriculum course guide. The four (4) course objectives identified and outlined in the curriculum course guide are as follows: (1) students will understand their responsibilities as citizens dealing with community issues; (2) students will know that their concern about people and events in the community can have positive effects; (3) students will develop pride in assisting others; and (4) students will provide services to the community without receiving pay.

The school district’s superintendent, Thomas Dolusio, states that the purposes of the community service program include the following:

a. To help students acquire life skills;
b. To help students learn about the significance of rendering service to their community;
c. To give students a sense of worth;
d. To give students a sense of pride;
e. To teach students about community organizations;
f. To give students a sense of appreciation of the worth of community organizations;
g. To help students understand their responsibilities as citizens in dealing with community issues;
h. To teach students that their concerns about people and events in the community can have positive effects;
i. To improve students’ self-esteem;
j. To improve the students’ ego and moral development;
k. To give students the opportunity to explore new roles, identities and interests;
l. To enhance the students’ willingness to take and accept new challenges;
m. To have students assume responsibility and to accept the consequence of their actions;
n. To develop intellectual development and academic learning in such areas as the expression of ideas, reading and record-keeping;
o. To promote higher-level thinking skills such as open-mindedness;
p. To enhance the skills of learning from experience;
q. To have students learn about and be exposed to service-related skills.

See Dolusio Aff. at ¶ 17.

Phyliss Walsh, the community service program director, was directed by the school district to write the curriculum for the program. As originally drafted, the community service program possessed two components. The first component of the draft program contemplated the classroom teaching and training of decision making, problem solving, and stress management skills. The second component of the draft program required the actual service to the community.

The program adopted by the school district only includes the community service component. Certain aspects of the classroom component of the draft program have, however, been incorporated into the community service component, including the integration of small group meetings into the program. The community service program was not designed to ensure and does not require that a correlation exist between a student’s community service experience and that student’s classroom coursework.

*1340 None of the defendants who voted in favor of adopting the community service program and graduation requirement expressed any dissatisfaction with the program’s course objectives and none of the defendants proposed any amendments to the stated objectives of the community service program. All of the defendants who voted for the challenged program believe that community service is an admirable and worthwhile endeavor. Further, all of the defendants believe that all people should participate in community service in one manner or another.

The purpose of the community service program is not to require children to provide clerical or maintenance services to the school district. Rather, as stated in the course objectives, the purpose of the program is to expose students to community service and to make students aware of the positive aspects of providing community service.

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Related

Earl v. Decatur Public Schools Board of Education
2015 IL App (4th) 141111 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 2015)
People v. McGlotten
134 P.3d 487 (Colorado Court of Appeals, 2005)
Lynn Ann Steirer v. Bethlehem Area School District
987 F.2d 989 (Third Circuit, 1993)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
789 F. Supp. 1337, 1992 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 4148, 1992 WL 82971, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/steirer-v-bethlehem-area-school-district-paed-1992.