Diverse Coalition Champions Religious Freedom in Texas Public Schools

Media Contact:
Kristi Gross, ACLU of Texas, [email protected]
Steve Feldman, URJ & RAC, [email protected]
Karlee Marshall, BJC & Christians Against Christian Nationalism, [email protected]
Imelda Mejia, Texas Freedom Network, [email protected]
Bee Moorhead, Texas Impact, [email protected]
Rev. Charles Foster Johnson, Pastors for Texas Children, [email protected]
Marco Guajardo, American Federations of Teachers-Texas, [email protected]
Moisés Serrano, Americans United, [email protected]
Amit Pal, Freedom From Religion Foundation, [email protected]
Shannon Morse, National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW) Dallas, [email protected]
Cameron Samuels, Students Engaged in Advancing Texas (SEAT), [email protected]

AUSTIN, Texas – A statewide coalition of diverse organizations and Texans across the state successfully empowered Texas families to defend the religious freedom of millions of Texas public school students from Senate Bill 11, the state-organized prayer in school law. Passed in the 2025 legislative session, S.B. 11 required school districts to vote on whether to adopt periods of state-organized prayer and religious study during the school day. The deadline to vote was March 1.

The coalition, comprising both religious and secular voices, empowered community leaders and school boards to reaffirm the value of religious diversity and the essential separation of religion and government in our democracy. Parents, students, teachers, clergy, and more spoke up in districts across the state. As the Texas Tribune reports, nearly all of Texas’s 1,200 school districts rejected S.B. 11. This includes many who adopted a coalition-supported alternative resolution emphasizing religious freedoms already present in public schools. As a result, millions of students in Texas are protected from coercive, divisive, and overbroad state-sponsored expressions of religion in schools.

This effort was organized in partnership between RAC-TX, Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty (BJC), Christians Against Christian Nationalism, American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, American Federation of Teachers-Texas, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Students Engaged in Advancing Texas (SEAT), National Council of Jewish Women Dallas, Texas Freedom Network, Texas Impact, Pastors for Texas Children, Faith Commons, and Freedom From Religion Foundation.

“School districts across the state overwhelmingly rejected S.B. 11 because inviting state-organized prayer into public schools would cause division, pressure students to conform, and distract schools from their core educational mission,” said Caro Achar (she/her), engagement coordinator for free speech and pluralism at the ACLU of Texas. “Texas students already have robust rights to pray and read religious texts on their own during the school day. This law didn’t address a real problem. Instead, it threatened to create new problems by blurring the line between church and state — putting students’ and families’ constitutional rights at risk.”

“S.B. 11 is part of an ongoing effort to undermine public institutions, especially our schools, in favor of Christian nationalist policies that govern based on a distorted version of one religion’s teachings,” said RAC Texas Field Organizer Blake Ziegler (he/him). “Reform Jews in Texas proudly stood alongside our interfaith and secular friends against this violation of religious freedom. S.B. 11 would hurt our Jewish students, excluding them from their peers instead of promoting the religious pluralism essential to our democracy.”

“The people of Texas aren’t buying what SB11 was selling,” said Rabbi David Segal, Policy Counsel at Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty (BJC). “This massive rejection of state-organized prayer proves that Texans value the separation of church and state. Student led prayer is already allowed in our public schools, it just shouldn't be a government-run program. We are proud to see districts across the state stand up for the religious freedom of every student, regardless of their faith tradition.”

"This is what democracy looks like,” said Carisa Lopez, deputy executive director of the Texas Freedom Network. “Across Texas, people of every faith – and no faith – came together to protect our shared right to practice religion freely, without the government telling our children when, how, and what to believe. SB 11 handed the state the power to organize prayer in public schools and put teachers in the impossible position of refereeing religious participation. Worst of all, it asked families to sign away their constitutional rights just to opt out. We are grateful to every school board member, parent, and coalition partner who showed up to protect our public school students and their religious freedom. Together we’ll continue fighting for the Texas we all deserve.”

From Texas Impact: “Texas Impact has always fought for religious freedom, and in the case of Senate Bill 11, that meant preventing Christianity from being pushed into public schools. Every student in Texas has the right to pray on their own time in any public school. Senate Bill 11 attempts to overstep by inserting prayer into our schools, per the advice of our Attorney General Paxton. We should let Texan families and faith communities lead religious education, not our elected officials.”

“Texas public schools serve all children from every conceivable faith tradition, and no faith tradition. They are public institutions that must not favor, advance, or establish any religion. Religion is for the congregation, home, and individual. When it becomes a tool of the state, both get corrupted. Every single time,” said Rev. Charles Foster Johnson, Executive Director at Pastors for Texas Children.

“SB 11 is just another in a long line of culture war bills meant to drive a wedge between us to keep people distracted from the bigger picture,” said Texas AFT President Zeph Capo. “School districts are just affirming what we know to be true: our students already enjoy religious freedom and SB 11’s prayer period imposes a specific agenda that would alienate students and educators alike. The brave organizers and students on the ground that advocated against SB 11 at school boards across the state deserve special recognition and Texas AFT is in this fight with them.”

“The resistance to implementing S.B. 11’s state-organized prayer periods in Texas public schools should send a message to state legislators that Texans don’t support the Christian Nationalist agenda of imposing one set of religious views on all public school children,” said Rachel Laser (she/her), president and CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. “Our Constitution’s promise of church-state separation means that students and their families – not politicians – get to decide if, when and how public school children engage with religion.”

“SB 11 is a transparent attempt to erode the constitutional separation between church and state by promoting religious activity in public schools,” said Freedom From Religion Foundation Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor (she/her). “Our classrooms must remain secular spaces that respect students of all beliefs and none.”

“I want my granddaughter to be able to go to school and be herself. I want her to not feel left out, or ‘othered,’ when she doesn’t participate in a state-organized prayer time, " said Robyn C., NCJW Dallas Advocacy Committee member. “I want every child to feel included, regardless of their faith or lack thereof."

“Students across Texas showed up to speak for themselves and their classmates. In places like El Paso, Bastrop, Katy, and many others, we saw students testify and share how important it is that public schools remain welcoming to people of every faith and those not observing a particular religion. The decisions by these districts to reject state-organized prayer periods reaffirm that religious freedom means everyone has a seat at the table. Our schools should be spaces where diversity is respected and no student feels pressured to participate in someone else's religious practice,” said SEAT Senior Policy Associate Azeemah Sadiq, a high school student in Alief ISD.