Order: Brownsville Area students may sit during Pledge of Allegiance
Brownsville Area School District officials have entered into a consent order that allows a 13-year-old middle school student to be seated during the Pledge of Allegiance, and requires the school board to publicly announce at its next public meeting that other students may sit.
Filed in federal court, the agreement was signed off on by district solicitor James T. Davis and American Civil Liberties Union attorneys Witold J. Walczak and Alexandra T. Morgan-Kurtz.
The agreement was struck Tuesday, one day after a student identified only as N.B. filed a suit that claimed her First Amendment rights were violated when she was punished with lunch detention and in-school suspension for not standing for the Pledge of Allegiance.
As part of the consent order, the district will “cease and desist from punishing or sanctioning plaintiff on account of her refusing to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, and shall take appropriate and necessary action to prevent in-school harassment of N.B. by other students whenever they are or become aware of it.”
The teen’s school record will be expunged of any references to the incidents outlined in the suit under the terms of the order.
The district will “officially and publicly at the next Brownsville Area School Board meeting, state that any student may elect to remain seated during the Pledge of Allegiance, and they will protect the rights of any student who chooses to do so,” the order states.
Additionally, officials will announce to the teachers, staff and students, both during morning announcements and in writing, that students “have a constitutional right to remain seated” during the pledge, but must do so quietly while others recite it, according to the agreement.
While the district and the ACLU came to a resolution on some things, the consent order stated that the agreement is not an admission of liability, and N.B., through her mother, Carolyn Raja, still can seek the monetary damages sought in the filing.
N.B. is a student at Brownsville Area Middle School, whose teacher, Jessica VanMeter, noticed was sitting during the pledge April 17, and asked her to stand.
The matter continued, and Principal Vincent Nesser told the teen’s mother she would have to stand or be disciplined.
Raja also spoke to Superintendent Philip Savini Jr., the suit alleged, and he agreed with Nesser.
The suit was filed after the teen received two in-school suspensions for not standing on April 23 and 24, and an ACLU attorney called the school on the teen’s behalf to say making her stand and recite the the pledge was unconstitutional.
The matter remains before U.S. District Court Judge Mark R. Hornack.