In my opinion it doesn't say that:
"wall of separation between church and state," as written in Thomas Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists Association in 1802. The original text reads: "...I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between Church & State." Jefferson reflected his frequent speaking theme that the government is not to interfere with religion.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". Together with the Free Exercise Clause ("... or prohibiting the free exercise thereof"), these two clauses make up what are called the "religion clauses" of the First Amendment.
The establishment clause has generally been interpreted to prohibit
1) the establishment of a national religion by Congress.
2) the preference by the U.S. government of one religion over another.
The first approach is called the "separation" or "no aid" interpretation, while the second approach is called the "non-preferential" or "accommodation" interpretation. The accommodation interpretation prohibits Congress from preferring one religion over another, but does not prohibit the government's entry into religious domain to make accommodations in order to achieve the purposes of the Free Exercise Clause.
IMO If the state prevents them from praying as they wish is a violation of the First Amendment.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". Together with the Free Exercise Clause ("... or prohibiting the free exercise thereof")
From another forum I frequent:
"According to the US Supreme Court who in the 1992 case of Lee v. Weisman, 505 U.S. 577 (1992) specifically rejected such an approach. That case was a reaffirmation of the clear principles of such landmark cases as Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421 (1962) and Abington v. Schempp, 324 U.S. 203 (1963) applied specifically to a high school graduation ceremony.
In the 1992 case the principal of Nathan Bishop Middle School in Providence, Rhode Island, Robert E. Lee, invited a Jewish rabbi to deliver a prayer at the 1989 graduation ceremony, the parents of student Deborah Weisman requested a temporary restraining order seeking to bar the rabbi from speaking. When the Rhode Island district court denied the Weismans' motion, the family did attend the graduation ceremony, and the rabbi did deliver the benediction. After the graduation, the Weismans continued their litigation, and won a victory at the First Circuit Court of Appeals. The school district appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that the prayer was nonsectarian and was doubly voluntary, as Deborah was free not to stand for the prayer and because participation in the ceremony itself was not required.
SCOTUS Justice Anthony Kennedy who was expected to water down the school prayer cases delivered the majority opinion strengthening the prohibition on even voluntary school prayer in such circumstances.
Mr. Justice Kennedy noted that even the nonsectarian nature of the prayer was no defense, as
the Establishment Clause forbade coerced prayers in public schools, not just those representing a specific religious tradition. Addressing the State's contention that attendance at the graduation exercises was voluntary, Kennedy wrote:
"To say a teenage student has a real choice not to attend her high school graduation is formalistic in the extreme. True, Deborah could elect not to attend commencement without renouncing her diploma; but we shall not allow the case to turn on this point. Everyone knows that, in our society and in our culture, high school graduation is one of life's most significant occasions. A school rule which excuses attendance is beside the point. Attendance may not be required by official decree, yet it is apparent that a student is not free to absent herself from the graduation exercise in any real sense of the term "voluntary," for absence would require forfeiture of those intangible benefits which have motivated the student through youth and all her high school years."
In answering the argument that participation in the prayer was itself voluntary, Mr. Justice Kennedy formulated what is now known as the coercion test:
"As we have observed before, there are heightened concerns with protecting freedom of conscience from subtle coercive pressure in the elementary and secondary public schools.
Our decisions in [Engel] and [Abington] recognize, among other things, that prayer exercises in public schools carry a particular risk of indirect coercion. The concern may not be limited to the context of schools, but it is most pronounced there.
What to most believers may seem nothing more than a reasonable request that the nonbeliever respect their religious practices, in a school context may appear to the nonbeliever or dissenter to be an attempt to employ the machinery of the State to enforce a religious orthodoxy."
Stave's remarks are disingenuous in the extreme and as is now being reported it was a subterfuge to put a moment of silence in the official program and turning a blind eye to the Lord's Prayer being recited by a student. "