I'm not saying this was right or wrong but Religion was a part of Public School Growing up in Glendale in the Los Angeles area in the 1950s

Things were very different in the 1950s. Drugs were not really a problem then like they have been since the 1960s. They existed but mostly only in ghettos then.

Also, in Grade School children were often sent I think it was on Tuesdays to their church for Sunday School. I wasn't sent to church because my church was deep in Los Angeles on Hope street (at least 1/2 hour or more away by Car). But, children who attended church locally in Glendale often were gone 3 or 4 hours every Tuesday I believe then. So, in some ways what is happening now it seems is reminiscent of what was still going on in the 1950s.

However, by the 1960s and 1970s at some point I think this sort of things stopped a lot, especially around the time of the Viet Nam War when people lost their faith in the U.S. government because of the Kennedy Assassination and the Viet Nam War which no one liked the lies the American people were told then and ever since. Of course it should also be noted that we were lied to about Kennedy's assassination in order to prevent a nuclear war which on one level is understandable. But, this caused a drop from 75% trust in our government down to around 11% trust in our government ever since.

One of the reasons Trump might be president is that trust in government continues to be so low.