The committee charged with developing a policy to address religious conflicts at the University of Utah may take religion out of the equation.
"We are now the Accommodations Committee," English professor and committee chairwoman Katharine Coles told a handful of students and professors who gathered Thursday to brainstorm on what the new policy might entail.
The group was impaneled as the Religious Accommodations Committee as part of a settlement agreement with former theater student Christina Axson-Flynn, who sued the school after she refused to swear in dramatic scenes.
"It's hard to know what might offend people of any religion or all religions," Coles said of the title change.
"We may move away from specifically addressing religious accommodations and more toward what accommodations can be made, how they can be made and how religion intersects with that," she said.
There were several issues surrounding the Axson-Flynn case that were not addressed by the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, said John Morris, the U.'s general counsel and a nonvoting member of the committee.
One item left unresolved by the settlement was the differing accounts of Axson-Flynn and theater professors over whether they had purposely assigned the LDS student swearing scenes once they knew of her religious preference.
Morris said neither the 10th Circuit's ruling nor the school's out-of-court settlement had compromised faculty members' rights to determine curriculum. He advised panel members to consider a policy that puts the onus on faculty to make clear the course requirements to students.
"With that knowledge, then the student can make the accommodations request," Morris said.