On February 5, 2026, the U.S. Department of Education released updated guidance on prayer and religious expression in public schools, replacing the Department’s 2023 guidance on the issue. The updated guidance states that all students, school faculty, and school officials generally have the right to engage in religious expression, including prayer, in public schools. 

However, the guidance also notes that the right to engage in religious expression in public schools is subject to certain limitations. Some of those limitations include that the individual engaging in the religious expression cannot do so as part an official school activity, and that the religious expression cannot invade the rights of others. 

Based on the foregoing principles, the guidance advises public schools on how to respond in a variety of situations involving issues of religious expression. Several of those scenarios are included below.

• Public schools must generally allow students to pray privately and quietly in class, at an athletic event, or before a meal. This also applies to school-sponsored events which occur off campus.

• Public schools must permit prayer in student groups and must support religious student groups in the same manner they support secular student groups. 

• Public schools may not sponsor or organize mandatory prayer at school events, and no person may deliver a prayer on behalf of the school. 

• Public schools may not require students to pray or otherwise affirm any religious belief as part of school instruction or schoolwork, even if the prayer or affirmation is part of instruction which is otherwise secular in nature.

• Public schools must permit school officials and faculty to pray on the same terms as students, provided that such prayer does not coerce others join the prayer or otherwise affirm it, and that such prayer does not function as official speech of the school. A faculty or school official’s visible, personal prayer alone does not on its own constitute impermissible coercion. 

• Public schools are authorized to continue ordinary disciplinary measures and must continue to protect students from targeted harassment, even when the offending student claims a religious basis for their actions. Speech rooted in sincere religious belief which offends, but does not constitute targeted harassment, threats, or advocacy for unlawful violence is typically protected speech and should not be subject to discipline.

When viewed alongside the Department’s 2023 guidance, the Department’s 2026 guidance is largely the same. The most notable difference is in tone. The Department’s 2023 guidance largely focused on describing what the First Amendment requires of schools when it comes to issues of religious expression. The new guidance, on the other hand, places a stronger focus on affirming the rights of students and faculty to engage in religious expression at school. 

“This is not the familiar but legally unsound metaphor of a “wall of separation” between religious faith and public schools. It is rather a stance of neutrality among and accommodation toward all faiths, and hostility toward none . . . .”

www.ed.gov/…