A former Marine and mother of five has filed a federal lawsuit against the Hillsboro School District in Washington County, Oregon, alleging officials denied her reimbursement for homeschool curriculum solely because the materials reflected a Christian worldview.
Tessa Bulzan joined the district’s homeschool partnership program in July 2025 after leaving a six-figure job. She told Fox News Digital that the decision to homeschool followed an incident at her children’s school that conflicted with her family’s moral and biblical beliefs.
“There was an incident where a teacher said something against our moral and biblical beliefs, and it was so convicting and, after a lot of prayer, my husband and I decided that I would quit my six-figure job and I would become a stay-at-home mother and start homeschooling our children,” Bulzan said. “And so far, it’s been the best decision we’ve ever made.”
Bulzan said the program initially seemed like an ideal fit, especially since her husband was earning less than $50,000 and homeschooling costs were a concern. She said the family’s existing curriculum, including Abeka and Classical Conversations materials, was approved by the district as meeting academic requirements.
“Then in January, when we went to go reimburse or seek reimbursement for that curriculum, we were denied solely on its author’s biblical world beliefs,” Bulzan said.
She said the denial came as a shock, since the family had planned to use the reimbursement funds for extracurricular activities and additional curriculum, including a cursive workbook used to help her daughter, who has dyslexia.
According to Bulzan, a district administrator acknowledged there was no comparable alternative at the same academic level, but said the materials still could not be funded because the books referenced God, included incidental Scripture, and reflected a biblical worldview.
“One-hundred percent, it was discrimination,” Bulzan said. “When I first started the program, I was told that all of my curriculum not only met the standards of the school board and the state of Oregon, but it excelled and went past most of their standards for all of their core.”
“So, math, arithmetic, writing, grammar, all of these books that I was using to satisfy their academic requirements were all being accepted and there was no argument, there was no denial of that,” she continued. “When I was denied, I wanted to understand, is it just because it’s the Bible or and my Christian beliefs, or is it because they just are trying to be neutral?”
Bulzan said she later found materials with differing religious content that had been approved for reimbursement.
“What I quickly realized is that that’s not true, that they were singling me out as a Christian because I bought two different books with very, very secular and very opposing worldviews that I, in my opinion, should not be taught or be within the school district,” she said. “One of them is of Indian or ancestral nature where they’re worshiping water spirits, and they believe that as you drink water, these spirits become part of you. And so they’re allowing other forms of worship for reimbursement, but they won’t allow my grammar book because it references God.”
Attorneys with Alliance Defending Freedom filed the lawsuit against the Hillsboro School District in federal court in September.
“We just filed this case in federal court in Oregon, so it’s very early stages, but the case is really clear here,” ADF attorney Kate Anderson said. “This is religious discrimination, and it’s discrimination that the Supreme Court and the Constitution does not stand for.”
Anderson said Supreme Court precedent bars government benefit programs from excluding religious content when funds are made broadly available.
“Over the last decade, the Supreme Court has over and over again said that when a government sets out a public benefit program like this funding that can go to any person, it cannot exclude religious conduct, religious content,” Anderson said. “In this case, it’s religious curriculum. Religious families need to be treated on equal footing with secular families and the same with their curriculum. And so this violates the Constitution very clearly, and we’re very hopeful that the court will step in quickly.”
A spokesperson for the Hillsboro School District told Fox News Digital the district could not comment on pending litigation.
