Should schools let kids walk out of class to protest ICE?

• M

  Maya9h ago

  The "civics by doing" argument only works if the school applies it equally to every political cause. The moment you staff-supervise one walkout and not another, the school isn't teaching civics — it's picking a side. That's the whole problem here and everyone defending it is skipping right past it.

  211Reply
• TT

  Taylor T.7h ago

  ^ Okay but that's an argument for better civics education, not against the walkout. Plenty of adults who vote don't know how half the government works either. "Some participants don't fully understand the issue" has never been a valid reason to suppress protest in America.

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• S

  Sam3h ago

  Nobody asking the obvious gap question here: what happens to the kids who DIDN'T walk out? Did they get regular instruction, or did the disruption tank their day too? Because if half the class leaves and the teacher is standing outside, the kids who stayed lost their education AND had no choice in it. That's the group we keep forgetting.

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• KL

  Kofi L.7h ago

  Here's the thing nobody wants to say out loud: if a teacher quietly herded kids to a pro-enforcement rally, that teacher would be fired by Monday. The double standard isn't a side issue, it's the whole issue. If you disagree, explain how you square that with a school's legal obligation to remain politically neutral.

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• S

  Sam8h ago

  I'm a high school history teacher in a district that did not participate in this, and I'll tell you what I actually think: unsupervised walkouts are a safety liability, supervised ones are a school-sponsored event. There is no clean middle ground. Either accept both labels or stop pretending you're neutral.

  67Reply
• CR

  Casey R.2h ago

  The confidently wrong take I keep seeing is that this is somehow unprecedented or uniquely radical. Student walkouts have been a recognized form of civic participation since at least the civil rights movement. Schools have navigated this for sixty years. This is not a new problem and the people acting like it is are either very young or very forgetful.

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• Q2

  Quinn 215h ago

  Schools are compulsory. Kids don't choose to be there. The idea that they should just accept whatever political silence the institution demands feels less like neutrality and more like control. The walkout is the kid's only lever.

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• SS

  Sam S.3h ago

  Cop at a rally analogy doesn't hold. A cop is government. A school staff member escorting kids to a specific political protest is the school's own employees facilitating the event. That's categorically different and the distinction matters legally and practically.

  46Reply
• S

  Sam9h ago

  My daughter was one of those kids in Colorado and I'm not going to pretend I wasn't scared watching the news, but I'm also not going to pretend she was wrong. She's 16, she knows what's happening in her neighborhood, and she walked out because she meant it. That's more civic engagement than most adults I know manage in a decade.

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• N

  Nina4h ago

  I grew up in a town where nobody ever protested anything ever and it showed. We graduated thinking politics was something that happened to other people. A little disruption is not the catastrophe adults are making it out to be.

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• C

  Casey2h ago

  I walked out of school in 1969. My parents were furious. My principal called it a disgrace. Fifty years later I have a granddaughter who walked out last week and I told her I was proud of her. Some things you just know were right even before you can argue them properly.

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• Q

  Quinn6h ago

  Former Marine here. I deployed twice defending the right to do exactly this. You don't have to agree with the cause to respect the act. Wish more people understood the difference.

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• D

  Drew7h ago

  To the teacher above — so your answer is schools should just lock the doors and let kids get hurt in an unsupervised crowd? That's a worse outcome than assigning a monitor. You're presenting a false choice to avoid taking any actual position.

  29Reply
• F

  Feli1h ago

  Look, bottom line from a school administrator's perspective — and yes I work in a district that dealt with this — you have two bad options: let them go unsupervised and assume liability for whatever happens, or supervise and get accused of endorsing it. There is no third door. The outrage from both sides suggests we made the exact right call because nobody's happy, which is usually where neutral actually lives.

  24Reply
• SL

  Sam L.3h ago

  The schools aren't "participants" in any meaningful political sense just because they assigned staff for safety. A cop at a rally doesn't endorse the rally. A crossing guard doesn't endorse the car. This framing is deliberately misleading and people keep falling for it.

  22Reply
• S

  Sam5h ago

  What I want to know — and I haven't seen anyone address it — is what the actual policy is for marking these absences. Excused? Unexcused? Because that answer tells you everything about where the school really stands.

  21Reply
• A

  Avery7h ago

  I immigrated legally, spent eight years on paperwork, paid every fee, followed every rule, and I still support these kids walking out. Legality and morality don't always line up and anyone who's actually read history knows that.

  19Reply
• RB

  Reese B.1h ago

  or very online

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• R

  Reese5h ago

  I'm a taxpayer and a parent and I'm genuinely on the fence here. I don't love that my taxes fund the supervision. I also don't love the idea of my kid being told to sit down and shut up when something happening in their community affects them directly. I've changed my mind three times since yesterday.

  17Reply
• N

  Nina2h ago

  okay the comment about kids who stayed is genuinely something I had not thought about and now I'm annoyed that I hadn't

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• T

  Taylor3h ago

  I teach civics, actually teach it, and I'll say this: the walkout generated more genuine discussion in my classroom the next morning than anything I've planned all semester. I spent the period barely talking. The kids just went. I don't know what that means for the "taxpayers fund instruction" argument but I'm noting it.

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• PT

  Priya T.9h ago

  cool so when can the kids who want to protest abortion walk out with staff escorts too? just asking for consistency

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• N9

  Nina 924h ago

  Someone earlier said kids don't even know what ICE stands for — okay, so they googled it during the walkout. That counts as learning. You don't come to protest with a dissertation, you come because something feels wrong and you figure out the details as you go. That's also how adults work.

  11Reply
• A9

  Avery 925h ago

  compulsory is exactly the word. if attendance is mandatory, then the time is owed to instruction. you can't have it both ways.

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• SL

  Sam L.8h ago

  honestly exhausted by this. kids have been walking out of school for decades. kent state protesters were "disrupting instruction" too. we survived.

  8Reply
• N

  Nina2h ago

  "Some things you just know were right before you can argue them properly" is honestly one of the more honest things anyone has said in this thread and also kind of a dangerous epistemology but I get it

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• TM

  Taylor M.7h ago

  my kid's school did this and he texted me from the parking lot like "mom I don't even know what ICE stands for." so yeah, organic civic engagement, very educational

  7Reply
• MM

  Maya M.4h ago

  that last comment is actually kind of reassuring and kind of terrifying at the same time

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• J

  Jamie6h ago

  the former marine comment is going to make people feel things and they won't be able to explain why. respect.

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• TK

  Taylor K.8h ago

  nope

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