Why Did the San Francisco School District Reverse Its Decision to Recognize Muslim Eid Holidays?
After years of Muslim community leaders in America calling for an official holiday on Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha, the educational authorities in San Francisco angered the Muslim and Arab community after retracting their decision to recognize Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha for Muslims as school holidays, in a move that the community considered a surrender to racist opposition.
On February 3, 2023, the British Middle East Eye website said that the San Francisco School District issued, at the end of January 2023, a number of recommendations regarding adding new holidays to the school year, including recognizing some religious holidays, without officially classifying them as It is holidays, or schools are closed these days.
Concerning Regression
Lara Kiswani, executive director of the Arab Resource & Organizing Center (AROC), said in a statement to the British website, “Essentially what’s happened is the district has turned its back on the Arab and Muslim community in San Francisco. They’ve found an ‘All Lives Matters’ solution to racist backlash.”
Kiswani considered that this decision sends the wrong message to the Muslim and Arab communities, and said, “I think this sets a very dangerous precedent in San Francisco.”
In August 2022, the San Francisco school district voted in favor of a resolution to add the Eid holidays—Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha—to the list of school holidays.
The decision attempted to include Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha in the San Francisco School District calendar, among the days when schools are closed in observance of the two holidays, and Muslim students will be given the opportunity to fully participate in these two holidays, and equal educational opportunities.
However, shortly after the decision was passed, the educational district was threatened with filing a lawsuit against it, accusing its decision to recognize the Eid holiday as a violation of the constitution because it favors one religion over the other.
Kiswani considered this regression worrisome and emphasized that it appears to be an indication of the growing right-wing trend that is attacking public education, adding that what is happening here in San Francisco is a reflection of a greater assault on public education.
There are an estimated 250,000 Muslims in the San Francisco Bay Area, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Several regions nationwide had adopted measures to recognize some religious holidays, such as Eid al-Adha and Eid al-Fitr, Yom Kippur, and Rosh Hashanah, without similar opposition.
Into the Holiday Calendar
In July 2022, The Hilliard City School Board, Ohio, USA, announced that Muslim holidays are considered an official holiday since the beginning of the academic year, which begins in 2025, after a pressure campaign led by 9 Muslim students in the city’s schools.
The council’s decision comes after Muslim students led a campaign calling for changing the calendar and adding the days of the Eid holiday and after they collected more than 1,600 signatures from the Hilliard community and petitioned the council on April 11 in favor of including the holiday.
After that, the council moved into the process of studying the decision and voted on it on July 7, and the result was five votes to zero in favor of the decision.
In a statement to the local channel 10WBNS in the state, Nadia Long, President of the Hilliard School Board, said that in practice, nearly 20% of their students were absent this year due to the Eid holiday, which disrupts the learning process for all the students, and this is just another reason why It makes sense to take a day off.
Making it easier for students to celebrate the holiday without sacrificing their schoolwork demonstrates the district’s commitment to inclusivity, diversity, and equity, Long added.
A number of activists and institutions on communication platforms welcomed the decision of the Hilliard Council, as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) praised it and described the day of the decision as a “celebration.”
The Hilliard Schools has been widely hailed for recognizing the Muslim holiday of Eid, according to Dawn Michael, an American activist. She expressed her hope that the district schools will also follow this decision.
Other Twitter users saw that the students of the Hilliard City schools had achieved what politicians and lawmen could not achieve.
Inclusion Message
In an interview with Al-Estiklal, the activist Hajiba Ben at Ohio said: “Muslims in America consider approving the Eid holiday in schools an important matter because it is a symbolic expression of cultural and religious pluralism in the United States. In addition to the fact that it is important for children, especially in schools, to feel that there is no conflict between their beliefs and their studies in their home country. Especially when exam days coincide with Muslim religious holidays, parents find themselves in a difficult situation. I think it’s very symbolic.”
She added: “We hope that this holiday will be recognized at the federal level after some states and cities have recognized the holiday for Muslims.”
In 2015 New York Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that public schools in his city will adopt an official holiday on Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha.
He said that hundreds of thousands of Muslim families will no longer have to choose between celebrating the holiest days and attending classes at school.
The mayor of the city announced on Twitter that, starting from this year, two holidays will be added to the calendar of New York schools in the list of official holidays in which studies stop.
This comes out of what the mayor of the city called “fairness” in exchange for the days when studies stop for other religious occasions, in addition to his desire for change to bring about more tolerance and understanding among students within the school system in the city.
Muslim students make up just under 10% of students in public schools, according to figures from the relevant authorities.
