The University of California did not violate students' freedom of expression and religion when it rejected some classes at a Riverside-area Christian school from counting toward UC admission, a Los Angeles federal judge has ruled.
In a case that has attracted significant attention in religious and academic circles nationwide since it was filed in 2005, the judge upheld the university's decision to disqualify several classes offered by Calvary Chapel Christian School of Murrieta for being too narrow or not academically rigorous enough to fulfill UC's entrance requirements.
In a final ruling issued Friday, U.S. District Judge S. James Otero said UC demonstrated a rational basis for rejecting Calvary Christian's English, history, government and religion courses and did not display any "animus" toward the school or its Christian doctrines.
The university's policy was constitutional despite allegations by the students and school of an anti-Christian bias, the judge said.
The decision will be appealed, said attorney Robert Tyler, who represents Calvary Christian, its student plaintiffs and a group of 4,000 Christian schools nationwide. Tyler said Tuesday that he was disappointed by Otero's ruling but was confident a higher court would find that UC violated the law by rejecting the classes for their religious content. The attorney also said the district judge had applied overly restrictive standards to the bias allegations.
All five students named in the case have since graduated from the school and two are enrolled at UC Riverside, where they were admitted based on their grades in other, UC-approved courses at Calvary Christian, Tyler said. But he said the case was important to pursue for current and future students nationwide.
The Assn. of Christian Schools International joined the case in arguing that UC was attempting to force Christian schools to water down their religious teachings.
"This case is about the future of private religious education and the right to be able to have your kids learn from a religious perspective," said Tyler, who is general counsel for a religious liberty law firm in Murrieta named Advocates for Faith and Freedom.
His four children attend Calvary Christian, which enrolls about 1,300 students in kindergarten through high school.
