The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments Tuesday in a Colorado preschool case that could reshape how states attach civil-rights conditions to public education money. The dispute, St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy, asks whether Colorado may require every provider in its universal preschool program—including religious schools—to offer enrollment without regard to sexual orientation or gender identity.

The immediate conflict involves two Catholic preschools near Denver. The broader question reaches much further: When a state creates a generally available education benefit, can it insist that participating religious providers follow the same nondiscrimination rule as secular providers, or must it offer religious exemptions? The Supreme Court’s docket confirms that the justices granted review on two questions concerning the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause and scheduled argument for November 3.

How Colorado’s program works

Colorado launched its Universal Preschool Program in 2023 after voters approved a dedicated funding source. The mixed-delivery system allows families to use public support at participating public, private or faith-based preschools. Four-year-olds generally receive 15 hours of state-funded preschool each week.

Participation comes with an equal-opportunity requirement. Providers must allow eligible children to enroll and receive services regardless of race, ethnicity, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity, housing status, income or disability. The program also uses enrollment priorities intended to match certain providers with children they are designed to serve, including students from low-income families or those with disabilities.

St. Mary Catholic Parish in Littleton, St. Bernadette Catholic Parish in Lakewood, the Archdiocese of Denver and two parents challenged the rule. Their brief says the parishes cannot accept families who reject Catholic teaching on marriage, sexuality and gender. They argue Colorado has conditioned a public benefit on abandoning religious exercise while granting secular enrollment preferences to other providers.

The state’s defense

Colorado responds that the rule is neutral and applies to all participating providers. In its filing, the state distinguishes a preference—such as giving priority to a child with a disability—from a refusal to consider an otherwise eligible family. It says religious preschools remain welcome in the program if they comply with the same enrollment protections.

The Denver-based 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with Colorado. Its 2025 opinion concluded that the equal-opportunity mandate was neutral and generally applicable. The court also found that Colorado’s preferences did not amount to exemptions from the nondiscrimination rule and that administrators lacked open-ended authority to excuse providers from it.

The Supreme Court declined to consider the challengers’ request to overrule Employment Division v. Smith, the 1990 precedent that generally permits neutral, broadly applicable laws even when they burden religious practice. But the questions accepted by the justices could narrow how that precedent operates. The court will examine what kinds of secular exceptions make a rule no longer “generally applicable” and when government funding conditions become unconstitutional discrimination against religious exercise.

Why the ruling could travel beyond Colorado

The argument arrives as public dollars increasingly move through programs that include private and religious schools. A decision favoring the parishes could make it harder for states to enforce uniform participation rules in preschool subsidies, vouchers, tuition assistance and other mixed-provider systems. A decision for Colorado could confirm that states may fund religious providers while requiring them to meet generally applicable access standards.

Recent reporting notes that the court has repeatedly expanded religious institutions’ access to public benefits. In Carson v. Makin, for example, the court held that Maine could not exclude religious schools from a tuition-aid program merely because they provided religious instruction. The Colorado dispute adds a different issue: whether a religious school receiving state money may be exempted from a condition tied to whom it will enroll.

The practical stakes are also personal. Colorado education reporting describes a program in which families can choose among hundreds of public and private sites, including dozens of religious providers. Advocates for the parishes say families should not lose a benefit because they select a school aligned with their faith. Advocates backing Colorado say public funds should not support the exclusion of children or parents protected by state law.

What to watch at argument

The justices’ questions may reveal whether they view Colorado’s enrollment priorities as true exceptions or as tools that operate within a universal nondiscrimination rule. They may also test whether the parishes are being excluded because they are religious, or because of conduct that Colorado would prohibit at any provider.

That distinction will shape the breadth of any ruling. A narrow decision could focus on the structure of Colorado’s matching system. A broader one could alter how governments nationwide draft eligibility requirements for publicly financed education programs. A decision is expected by the end of the court’s current term.

The Educator's Takeaway

For district leaders, early-childhood administrators and private-school partners, the case is less about whether religious providers may receive public funds—the court has largely settled that question—than about which conditions may accompany those funds. The argument will clarify whether enrollment priorities, discretionary waivers or other program features can trigger a duty to accommodate religious objections. Administrators overseeing mixed-provider systems may need to distinguish carefully between preferences that expand access and exclusions that deny it. Until the court rules, existing Colorado requirements remain in place, and the case does not itself invalidate nondiscrimination provisions elsewhere. Its eventual reasoning, however, could influence contracts, provider handbooks and eligibility standards far beyond preschool.