Cranston Teachers’ Alliance files lawsuit over Good Friday observance

Daniel Kittredge
Posted 3/16/15

The Cranston Teachers’ Alliance (CTA) on Monday announced it is taking legal action over the ability of its membership to observe the Good Friday holiday.

According to a press release from the …

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Cranston Teachers’ Alliance files lawsuit over Good Friday observance

Posted

The Cranston Teachers’ Alliance (CTA) on Monday announced it is taking legal action over the ability of its membership to observe the Good Friday holiday.

According to a press release from the union, a lawsuit was filed alleging a breach of contract after “a number” of employees were denied religious leave for the April 3 holiday.

Good Friday, along with the Jewish holidays Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, were scheduled as school days on the 2014-15 calendar adopted by the School Committee last year.

The union states that agreements in place with the CTA’s three bargaining units – teachers, teacher assistants and bus aides, and technical assistants – allow every employee to take up to two days of religious leave per year.

“Some employees availed themselves of this leave provision for the Jewish Holy Days in the fall,” reads the CTA’s release. “When a number of Christians notified the Cranston School Department that they were taking religious leave to observe Good Friday, their leave was denied. The denial of religious leave triggered the lawsuit.”

Aside from the contractual issue, the union alleges that the denial of leave to the employees in question constitutes a violation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the Rhode Island Civil Rights Act and the Rhode Island Fair Employment Practices Act.

“If the Cranston School Committee wants to open schools on important religious holidays, they must honor and respect their employees’ religious beliefs” CTA President Lizbeth Larkin states in the release. “I wish they had not opened school on the Jewish Holy days and Good Friday, but since they made that decision they should not be telling Christians of all denominations that Good Friday is not important enough to merit a religious leave day.”

According to the CTA’s release, the school district has decided not to use Good Friday as a testing day for the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC.

The School Committee was scheduled to meet Monday night. The Herald will have more on this story as it develops.

Comments

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  • ronruggieri

    I am painfully reminded of the not forgotten PRAYER ON THE SCHOOL WALL controversy a while back. I do believe in separation of Church and State but not in the hateful spirit of the New Atheism-which has declared open war on both the Islamic faith and the Catholic and Protestant faiths. Ask ANY pre-Vatican II Catholic about the significance of Good Friday ? A whole , quite profound, theology of suffering is built up on this mystical holy day of OBLIGATION.

    It is NOT a paranoid delusion that religious freedom is being attacked in this country. In the gay marriage controversy people forget that the Catholic position was no different from Jewish Orthodoxy. Yet Bishop Thomas Tobin here was made an ogre for just representing his ancient Catholic faith.

    By the way , I have can live with state certified gay marriage. And legal abortion( no church can dictate civil law ).

    It is the New Atheism that is doing the devil's work in the cultural wars. God bless its own high priests, ex-Trotskyist Christopher Hitchens and crackpot biologist Dawkins ! ( In Hell winking is the Objectivist, Ayn Rand , militant atheist author of " The Virtue of Selfishness ".

    ( http://radicalrons.blogspot.com )

    Tuesday, March 17, 2015 Report this

  • RIposter

    There is no such thing as religious freedom. You have the right to practice religion but there is the provisions set forth that we have a clear separation of church and state. The Constitution also guarantees us Freedom from religion so all these attempts to undermine our Constitution to force people to observe their personal beliefs are an assault on our Constitution. Leave your religion in your church please.

    Tuesday, March 17, 2015 Report this

  • allent

    whole lot of waaaaah coming from Cranston

    Tuesday, March 17, 2015 Report this

  • HerbTokerman

    Take PTO or a sick day...

    Welcome to the rest of the real world where hardly anyone will get good friday off.

    I highly doubt that they would say anything if you called out for religious reasons..

    Tuesday, March 17, 2015 Report this

  • ronruggieri

    Wow, " there is no such thing as religious freedom " ? This can't be ACLU gone berserk ? It is just a fact that not a few ACLU lawyers are liberal Jews here in America . But they have no problem with Israel as an officially JEWISH state.I note that the surprise Netanyahu election victory there yesterday is bad news for the poor oppressed Palestinians, mostly of the Islamic faith. Is there an ACLU equivalent for them in Israel ? Too many Jewish professionals have abandoned their traditional Democratic liberalism in order to worship an idol, the Zionist state of Israel. And their Zionist lobby is indeed undermining religious freedom in America-even for Orthodox Jews.

    Wednesday, March 18, 2015 Report this

  • andy230

    Sick and tired of hearing take a sick day like the rest of the world as to from a lot of people. The people who did request the day Will be docked a personal day. . I for one do not go to church and did not request the day. Teachers are not fighting to get this day out for all teachers and students. The issue is not having the day off it is that people that actually observe the holiday were denied. Just wish people would get their facts straight. I will be in work that day and I don't work in the "real world" like all the teacher haters like to throw out as their go to comment.

    Wednesday, March 18, 2015 Report this