Stark v. St. Cloud State University

• Citation: 802 F.2d 1046
• Decision Date: 08 October 1986
• Docket Number: No. 85-5135,85-5135
• Parties: , 35 Ed. Law Rep. 387 Matthew STARK and Erma Sentz, Appellees, v. ST. CLOUD STATE UNIVERSITY, Minnesota State University Board, Larry Putbrese, Field Experience Coordinator, St. Cloud State University, Appellants.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (8th Circuit)

Page 1046

802 F.2d 1046

55 USLW 2257, 35 Ed. Law Rep. 387

Matthew STARK and Erma Sentz, Appellees, v. ST. CLOUD STATE UNIVERSITY, Minnesota State University Board, Larry Putbrese, Field Experience Coordinator, St. Cloud State University Appellants.

No. 85-5135.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

Submitted Dec. 9, 1985.

Decided Oct. 8, 1986.

Cindy L. Lavorato, St. Paul, Minn., for appellants.

Stanford Robins, Minneapolis, Minn., for appellees.

Before ROSS, Circuit Judge, BRIGHT, Senior Circuit Judge and BOWMAN, Circuit Judge.

BRIGHT, Senior Circuit Judge.

St. Cloud State University, a Minnesota public university, permits students seeking to become licensed teachers to fulfill student teaching requirements by instructing at parochial schools. The district court ¹ granted a declaratory judgment, holding that the University's policy violates the Establishment Clause of the first amendment by primarily promoting religion and tending to excessively entangle the state with religion. These rulings are challenged on appeal. For the reasons discussed below, we affirm.

I. BACKGROUND.

St. Cloud State University requires students seeking an education degree to take a course in student teaching for one academic quarter (about eleven or twelve weeks). The teaching experience usually earns the student sixteen credits. Candidates for other University degrees must take the course to obtain a Minnesota teaching license.

In the student teaching course, the University places the student in an elementary or secondary school that has contracted to become a student teaching site. The University pays the participating school $6 per credit--$96 for each student teacher per quarter--but places no limits on the participating school's use of the money.

The student teacher begins the quarter by observing the techniques and methods of a licensed teacher employed by the participating school. As the quarter progresses, the student teacher assumes more and more responsibility, until eventually the student actually teaches the class under the full-time supervision of the cooperating teacher. Approximately once a week during the placement, a supervisor from the University observes the student teacher's classroom performance. The supervisor makes written evaluations, which are discussed with the student and the cooperating classroom teacher.

In the late 1970's, Cathedral High School of St. Cloud, a private parochial school, made several requests to serve as a student teaching site for the University. Although the University initially rejected Cathedral's advances, it placed a University student, with the student's consent, at Cathedral in the spring of 1980. The University and Cathedral entered into the standard contract designating Cathedral as a student teaching site.

Following the execution of the Cathedral contract, the University promulgated a formal policy entitled, "St. Cloud State University Policy Regarding the Establishment of Student Teaching Sites at Private and Private Parochial Schools." This policy provides that private and parochial schools can become student teacher sites if they meet the criteria required of public schools. A student can, at his or her option, be placed at a private or parochial school selected by the University to participate in its student teaching program. Final approval of the student's placement, however, rests with the University's field experience coordinator. Under the policy, the University must advise those students placed at parochial schools that the student's participation in any religious aspect of the school "is exclusively between the parochial school's personnel and the student teacher." Further, the University will "provide accommodation for any of its student teaching supervisors who, based upon religious grounds, object to conducting on-site visits to a private parochial school." ²

Although sufficient public schools existed for student placements at all relevant times, the University placed three students at parochial schools prior to this lawsuit. Two students taught at Cathedral High School, ³ one in social studies and the other in English. Another student taught kindergarten at St. Peter and Paul's Primary School. Both parochial schools are members of the Catholic Diocese of St. Cloud and are funded, in part, by their parishes. The University conducted these student teaching courses in the usual manner, with the students receiving the typical observation and evaluation from a cooperating parochial school teacher and a University supervisor. The University paid the parochial schools the ordinary rate, and placed no limitations on the schools' use of this money. ⁴

Erma Sentz, a University professor, and Matthew Stark, a Minnesota resident and a taxpayer, sought a declaratory judgment that the University's policy violates the Establishment Clause, and requested a permanent injunction against its further enforcement. They named as defendants the St. Cloud State University, the Minnesota State University Board, which supervises the state universities, and Larry Putbrese, who is the University's field experience coordinator. Both St. Cloud State University and the Minnesota State University Board are state agencies. See Minn.Stat. Sec. 16.011.

On cross-motions for summary judgment, the district court concluded that, on the undisputed facts, the University's policy had the primary effect of advancing religion and tended to excessively entangle the state with religion. The district court therefore granted the plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment, declaring that the policy violated the Establishment Clause of the first amendment, and permanently enjoining its further implementation. This appeal follows.

II. DISCUSSION.

When reviewing an appeal from a district court's grant of a motion for summary judgment, this court applies the same standards as the district court was to have applied. Kresse v. Home Insurance Co., 765 F.2d 753, 754 (8th Cir.1985). The facts in this case are essentially undisputed, and the district court properly determined that the case could be decided as a matter of law. Burford v. Tremayne, 747 F.2d 445, 447 (8th Cir.1984); see Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c). Although the appellants contend that the district court failed to give them all favorable inferences that could be drawn from the facts, see Snell v. United States, 680 F.2d 545, 547 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 989, 103 S.Ct. 344, 74 L.Ed.2d 384 (1982), examination reveals that their dispute lies not with the facts as determined by the district court, but with the legal conclusion that the court held must follow from those facts. The issue before us, therefore, is whether the district court properly determined that the University's policy violated the Establishment Clause of the first amendment.

The first amendment of the Constitution begins with the stern enjoinder that "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion." The purpose of this emphatic mandate, applicable to the states through the fourteenth amendment, Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1, 15, 67 S.Ct. 504, 511, 91 L.Ed. 711 (1947), is "to prevent, as far as possible, the intrusion of either [the church or the state] into the precincts of the other." Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602, 614, 91 S.Ct. 2105, 2112, 29 L.Ed.2d 745 (1971). It prohibits "sponsorship, financial support, and active involvement of the sovereign in religious activity," Committee for Public Education & Religious Liberty v. Nyquist, 413 U.S. 756, 772, 93 S.Ct. 2955, 2965, 37 L.Ed.2d 948 (1973) (quoting Walz v. Tax Comm'n, 397 U.S. 664, 668, 90 S.Ct. 1409, 1411, 25 L.Ed.2d 697 (1970)), and demands that the states steer "a course of neutrality among religions, and between religion and nonreligion," Grand Rapids School Dist. v. Ball, --- U.S. ----, 105 S.Ct. 3216, 3222, 87 L.Ed.2d 267 (1985). The Establishment Clause does not represent, however, a blanket prohibition of every government program that indirectly aids a religious institution. "It has never been thought either possible or desirable to enforce a regime of total separation" between the state and religion. Nyquist, 413 U.S. at 760, 93 S.Ct. at 2959.

Because the University constitutes a state agency, its placement policy will violate the Establishment Clause if the policy fails to satisfy the three-prong test developed by the Supreme Court in Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602, 91 S.Ct. 2105, 29 L.Ed.2d 745 (1971). First, the policy must serve a secular purpose. Second, the primary effect of the policy cannot be to advance or inhibit religion. Third and last, the policy cannot foster an excessive entanglement of the state with religion. Id. at 612-13, 91 S.Ct. at 2111.

Although simple to state, the three-prong Lemon test presents difficult questions of interpretation and application. See Mueller v. Allen, 463 U.S. 388, 392, 103 S.Ct. 3062, 3065, 77 L.Ed.2d 721 (1983). The first prong, whether the policy has a secular purpose, poses the least problems. The University assertedly adopted its placement policy in an effort to provide for its students' education by increasing the number of available student teaching sites. This purported objective certainly constitutes a valid secular purpose, although the overabundance of existing sites casts some doubt on whether it actually motivated the policy's adoption. Cf. Larkin v. Grendel's Den, Inc., 459 U.S. 116, 103 S.Ct. 505, 510, 74 L.Ed.2d 297 (1982) ("There can be little doubt that [the state's asserted objective] embraces valid secular legislative purposes. However, these valid secular objectives can be readily accomplished by other means * * *.") (footnote omitted). We are "reluctan[t] to attribute unconstitutional motives" to a governmental body, however, Mueller v. Allen, 463 U.S. at 394, 103 S.Ct. at 3067, and therefore will accept the University's avowed purpose for this appeal.

But a secular purpose cannot save the...