Christian Fundamentalists Make Influence Felt on School Boards : Politics: Their election victories and activism have called into question longstanding policies in a number of districts.

By JONATHAN GAW

March 23, 1992 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Little more than a year after sweeping into office as apostles of the “religious right’s” growing political activism, Christian fundamentalists on San Diego County school boards are shaking up more than a dozen local school districts.

Many of the new school board members have brought into heated debate longstanding policies such as counseling to pregnant teen-agers and the release of students for confidential medical appointments during school hours.

They also have:

* Objected to self-esteem programs, which they say emphasize the students’ ability to guide their lives rather than the families’ role.

* Criticized a popular spelling curriculum called “Wizards,” contending that the fairies and ogres it uses to make spelling fun promote the occult.

* Sought to keep from students books and plays that they see as promoting sinful styles of life or raising the specter of Satanism.

“The founding fathers built their laws, their standards for society, on biblical principles, and the Bible is real clear on marriage and homosexuality. And one is definitely acceptable and good and the other is clearly wrong,” said Deidre Holliday, a Vista Unified School Board member who ran on a platform of “returning (schools) to the values that were held by our founding fathers.”

Last year, 24 candidates won out of 46 school board contestants featured on an anti-abortion slate distributed to churches throughout the county by the local chapter of the California Pro-Life Council. Many, though possibly not all, are part of a Christian fundamentalist movement.

“Our nation was founded on the Judeo-Christian ethic, and that is something that I feel is the basis of the success of our nation for the first 150 years,” La Mesa-Spring Valley Trustee Donald Smith said. “I think we have seen a lot of real serious social and economic problems develop as we depart from those values.”

Those two-dozen school board victories were the punctuation point on an impressive 1990 political debut in which the Christian activists gained control of the local Republican Party’s governing body and won two-thirds of nearly 90 low-profile races that they contested in San Diego County.

Hoping to demonstrate that 1990 was not a political fluke, they plan to target twice as many local campaigns this year--contests being watched closely by admiring Christian activists nationwide who hope to imitate the so-called “San Diego model.”

Because the Christian activists lack majorities on the school boards--a situation they hope to change this year--they have wrought little change in school policy. But they have shaken up districts by forcing new votes on controversial issues ranging from curriculum to pregnancy counseling.

Last August, the Poway Unified school board, under pressure from parents led by Assembly candidate Connie Youngkin, imposed limits on how school employees may discuss pregnancy alternatives with students. The policy also prohibits district employees from excusing students from school for confidential medical appointments.

The policy does allow for schools to provide to students and parents information on community agencies that offer pregnancy counseling services.

Teachers and dissenting board members said that, although the policy only put into writing what was already in practice at the schools, the debate caused unnecessary upheaval.

“In the eyes of most of us close to the situation, it was not a real issue. It was not based on anything we were doing or anything that had happened. It was just an issue that came out of thin air,” said Bill Crawford, president of the Poway Federation of Teachers.

In the San Dieguito Union High School District last year, Christian fundamentalist board member Sherry Hodges raised objections to a play performed by Torrey Pines High School students, saying “the students swore continuously, over and over again, and there was reference to every type of sex act.”

Hodges, who made her complaints after the performance, also objected to the play, a Pulitzer Prize-winner titled “Shadow Box,” because “the one balanced relationship in the whole play was the homosexual one.”

Finally, Hodges complained that “the play gave a feeling of absolutely no hope, and that life was miserable.”

But other board members dismissed Hodges’ objections.

“It was a serious play with a serious theme that our high school students are capable of dealing with,” Trustee Mary Lou Shultz said. “If all we do is ‘Mary Poppins’ in the school, the kids will know what we are doing.”

Schultz said the students need to consider and understand a wide variety of readings to understand the widely diverse segments of society.

“It concerns me that a board member is going through and attempting to censor what students are going to be studying,” she said, adding that the play had gone through an extensive review that included parents and community members.

The proposed school voucher initiative has also been an issue for many of the Christian fundamentalist board members. Vouchers would allow parents to place their children in any public, private or parochial school, with public money following the student.

School boards of most districts in the state have voted unanimously to denounce the voucher initiative because it would pull money from the public schools. But Christian fundamentalist board members in the county--many of whom have children in parochial schools--have dissented.

The religious right lost on those issues but has scored a few significant victories.

In September, Vista Unified adopted a policy that requires schools to notify parents before their children can be released from school for confidential medical appointments.

The policy was proposed by newly elected board member Holliday, who ran on a “traditional family values” platform last year and included the Christian symbol of the fish on her campaign literature.

Parents and community members later pressured the board in Oceanside on the same issue, but the trustees there voted to continue the practice of allowing students to leave campus without parental permission for confidential medical appointments.

Causes promoted by Christian fundamentalists also have cropped up in districts that have no members of the religious right on the board.

In the Escondido Union Elementary School District earlier this year, parents complained to the district about the Roald Dahl book “The Witches,” alleging that the popular story about a bewitched boy promoted occultism.

The district administration responded by taking the award-winning book off its library’s circulating shelves and requiring written permission from a student’s parent before it could be checked out.

The school board then stripped the superintendent of the power to restrict the circulation of library books and is reviewing its book-review policies.

Parents at one elementary school in Vista objected during the past year to “Wizards.” During that same year, other parents, led by board member Holliday, raised questions regarding the use of the novel “Candide” by Voltaire in a high school English class and the content of an anti-substance abuse program called “Here’s Looking at You 2000.”

“There was no place where they really came out and said it’s wrong to take drugs. It just had a sort of nebulous statement that too much of some things could be bad,” Holliday said.

Holliday complained in a report to the school that the program gave equal time to “reasons for drug use” with reasons against, and that “the reasons for drug use can appear to be very attractive.”

Holliday also objected because the program said each person makes a choice about drugs, rather than laying down the definitions of what was right and wrong for the students. The program also included a self-esteem component that Holliday said took “a very self-centered approach.”

In response to fears that a wave of conservatism on its school board would encroach on the classrooms, the Vista Teachers Assn. in late September won an academic-freedom clause in its contract to shield teachers from community pressure when they tackle controversial subjects.

Although teachers believe they have to protect themselves from what they see as attacks on freedom in the classroom, Holliday and others argue that they are simply looking out for the rights of parents.

“I don’t think that our people are anything beyond the mainstream,” said Steve Baldwin, a conservative political consultant who helped many of the Christian activists with their 1990 campaigns.

“Sure, they want parents to review sex education before it is shown to the kids. Sure, they want a curriculum that stresses abstinence. But these are concerns not just of Christians but also those of most parents out there,” Baldwin said.

Opponents, who include some current school board members who fear for their own political futures, say it goes beyond expression of concern for the lack of parental input to pushing a “theocratic agenda.” Opponents accuse the Christian fundamentalists of imposing their religious values on schools while being intolerant of others.

“Oh, you’re talking about them. We have two of them on our board,” said Hawley Ridenour, a three-term member of the La Mesa-Spring Valley school board, referring to Smith, a trustee, and Cheryl Jones, another fundamentalist board member.

“My perception is that their strategy is to stay low-key for another two years, and then win one more seat. Then it’s all over, there won’t be any discussion because the vote will always be 3-2,” Ridenour said. He does not plan to run for reelection when his term expires in 1992.

Anti-Abortion Office Holders

Twenty-four school board candidates from an anti-abortion slate distributed by the California Pro-Life Council in 1990 won office. Many, although possibly not all, belong to a wave of Christian activism in the schools.

Margo Perry -- Borrego Springs Unified

Eugene Olsen -- Cajon Valley Union

Nancye Splinter -- Cajon Valley Union

John Davis -- Cardiff Elementary

Shirley Giese -- Del Mar Union

Tracy Casey -- Encinitas Union

William Horn -- Escondido Union High

Michael Morasco -- Escondido Union High

Bruce Studebaker -- Escondido Union High

Rebecca Clark -- Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College

Maynard Olsen -- Grossmont Union High

Kevin Howe -- Lakeside Union