The fact that government dollars—state and local—support religious schools raises serious issues pertaining to the Establishment Clause of the US Constitution. In addition, these schools are sometimes unaccredited and therefore unregulated, which means they aren’t required to follow the same rules as public schools with regard to safety or curriculum. As a result, science classes may teach creationism and geology may cover just 6,000 years.

Further, religious schools don’t face the same rules guarding against discrimination. Some religious schools, for instance, openly discriminate against LGBTQ people, teaching that gay or gender-nonconforming students are sinners and refusing to hire LGBTQ teachers.