Williams v. Bd. of Educ.
| Decision Date | 16 May 2023 |
| Docket Number | 20 C 4540 |
| Parties | AMONTAE WILLIAMS, Plaintiff, v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF THE CITY OF CHICAGO; THE DAVID LYNCH FOUNDATION; and the UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois |
Amontae Williams has sued the Board of Education of the City of Chicago (the Board), the David Lynch Foundation (DLF), and the University of Chicago (the University) for violations of the Establishment Clause and Free Exercise Clause of the federal constitution and the Illinois Religious Freedom Restoration Act (IRFRA). In earlier decisions, this Court granted the defendants' motion to dismiss Williams's amended claim in part and his motion for leave to amend his complaint. See Separation of Hinduism From Our Schs. v Chicago Pub. Schs., City of Chicago Sch. Dist. #299, No 20 C 4540, 2021 WL 2036536 (N.D. Ill. May 21, 2021); Separation of Hinduism From Our Schools v. Chicago Pub Schs., No. 20 C 4540, 2021 WL 3633939 (N.D. Ill. Aug. 17, 2021). The Court also denied Williams's motion for class certification, dismissed his father Darryl Williams's claim for lack of standing, and denied Williams's motion for reconsideration of that decision. See Williams v. Bd. of Educ. of the City of Chicago, No. 20 C 4540, 2022 WL 4182434 (N.D. Ill. Sept. 13, 2022); Williams v. Bd. of Educ. of the City of Chicago, No. 20 C 4540, 2022 WL 17082571 (N.D. Ill. Nov. 18, 2022). The claims that remain are Williams's claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the Board and DLF and his IRFRA claim against all three defendants. The defendants now move for summary judgment and Williams cross-moves for partial summary judgment.
For the reasons stated below, the Court grants summary judgment for the defendants on Williams's IRFRA claim but otherwise denies both sides' motions.
The Court recounts the following facts from the parties' Local Rule 56.1 statements, exhibits, and summary judgment briefing. The facts as set out below are undisputed except where otherwise noted.[1]
Williams attended Bogan Computer Technical High School (Bogan) in Chicago from fall 2017 until he graduated on June 18, 2019. While Williams was a student, Bogan implemented the Quiet Time program during the 2017-18 and 2018-19 school years.
Each defendant played a role in implementing the Quiet Time program in Bogan and seven other Chicago schools. The Board approved the program and entered into a services contract with DLF, which stated that DLF was to operate Quiet Time in schools and hire certified instructors to teach Transcendental Meditation to interested students. The Board also permitted the University to conduct a study researching and evaluating the effects of Quiet Time. The agreements between the Board, DLF, and the University did not indicate that Quiet Time was religious or mention any other religious programming.
The Board permitted each individual school's principal to decide whether to implement Quiet Time. Bogan Principal Alahrie Aziz-Sims agreed to introduce Quiet Time at Bogan after meeting with DLF representatives and learning Transcendental Meditation herself. As part of the Quiet Time program, Bogan implemented two fifteenminute periods of quiet activity during each school day. Williams testified during his deposition that during the 2017-18 school year he saw other students "choos[ing] to sneak and be on their phone or go to sleep or whatever, but no one was meditating." Defs.' Joint LR 56.1 Stat., Ex. 1, at 69:12-15 (dkt. no. 216-2) (Williams Dep.).
According to Williams, his first experience with Transcendental Meditation as a part of the Quiet Time program occurred during the 2018-19 school year, when he was eighteen years old. He stated that he did not receive any letters about the program to give to his parents, but in October 2018 he and other students were given a document titled "Quiet Time Program Student Application for Transcendental Meditation Instruction Bogan High School." Id. at 85:23-86:2, 91:1-10. He also stated that he had been informed that Transcendental Meditation was "a really effective way to meditate and find yourself" and that he signed the form when it was first presented to him because he "was interested learning [meditation] properly." Id. at 96:21-22, 97:10-11. Although the document included language stating that "learning the TM technique is an optional activity," Williams maintained it was "not optional" and "mandated" for students to sign the document. Id. at 100:17-18, 15. He explained that this was because students who initially chose not to learn Transcendental Meditation "eventually had to sign up," though "off the top of [his] head at the [moment]" he was unable to name any student who did not sign the document at first and later "was forced to do [Transcendental Meditation]." Id. at 101:3, 102:11-18. As for meditating during the fifteen-minute Quiet Time periods, Williams did not dispute that "if [he] didn't want to do [Transcendental Meditation], [he] didn't have to." Id. at 122:16-21.
In contrast, Principal Aziz-Sims testified during her deposition that students could choose not to learn Transcendental Meditation. She stated that although students who were disrupting others during Quiet Time may have been reprimanded by a teacher, an administrator, or the principal herself, she was not aware of any Bogan student being disciplined for choosing not to learn Transcendental Meditation. She also testified that she approved giving students at least two letters explaining Quiet Time to their parents and allowing their parents to opt out of the program, in accordance with the school's policy regarding student involvement in other school activities.
Sunita Martin, an independent contractor with DLF who was involved in implementing Quiet Time, similarly stated that students were given an "opt-out packet" and instructed to "take it home and give to their parent or guardian so that they could look it over and if their parent was not interested in them learning, then they would return that to us so we could know." Def.'s LR Stat. 56.1, Ex. 14 at 84:1-8. Students who were interested in learning Transcendental Meditation "could fill out a one-page form with their name, the classroom that they were in so that we could keep record of who was interested and who was not." Id. at 84:11-14. Various other employees of the University and DLF also testified that learning Transcendental Meditation was optional and that they did not witness any students being required to meditate during Quiet Time.
Williams signed the consent form and began learning Transcendental Meditation in October 2018. He and other students who learned Transcendental Meditation participated in a training course for one hour each day over the course of four days. On the first day of his training, Williams was present for a three-to-four-minute initiation ceremony. The initiation took place at a classroom at Bogan. It involved a Transcendental Meditation instructor placing assorted items in front of a painting of a man and speaking in Sanskrit. The items varied from one initiation to the next, but could include flowers, fruit, a candle, rice, water, and sandalwood powder. Williams testified that he mostly stood and observed the initiation, but at one point the instructor asked him to repeat words in a language that he did not understand. He stated that when he asked what the words he repeated meant, the instructor informed him that those words did not have any meaning. The instructor also gave Williams a "mantra" on his first day of training and instructed him to repeat it while meditating. Williams said that the instructor told him the mantra "didn't have any meaning" and was a tool to help him relax during meditation. He further testified that the "only thing [the Quiet Time staff] claim[ed]" over the course of the program was that "anything they were showing us had no deep significance to it or meaning behind it and just to do [it]." Id. at 118:23119:3, 112:24-113:2. Students who did not learn Transcendental Meditation were neither present for the initiation nor given a mantra.
On occasion throughout the 2018-19 school year, Transcendental Meditation instructors came to Williams's classroom and led him and other students through a meditation. During those sessions, the instructors rang a bell to start meditation, told the students to think of their mantra during the meditation, and rang another bell to end meditation. Not every student in Williams's class meditated during the instructor-led meditations, and Williams stated that he personally practiced Transcendental Meditation approximately twenty-five percent of the time during the fifteen-minute Quiet Time periods until the spring of 2019.
Around that time, substitute teacher Dasia Skinner approached Williams and informed him that she believed Transcendental Meditation was a religious practice. Williams testified that after speaking with Skinner-who was neither trained in Transcendental Meditation nor involved in implementing Quiet Time-and doing "his own research," he concluded that the mantra he received and the initiation ceremony were related to Hinduism. Williams also agreed, however, that the meditation instructors and Quiet Time program staff did not instruct him to "believe in a particular religion or particular deity." Williams Dep. at 112:4-11. Williams stopped practicing Transcendental Meditation after speaking with Skinner, and he graduated from Bogan when the school year ended on June 18, 2019. Williams brought this suit on August 3, 2020.
Summary judgment is appropriate if there is no genuine dispute of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as...
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