USA TODAY International Edition
Students should know rights on protests
Schools are preparing for walkout in different ways
Students across the USA are planning to walk out of class Wednesday to commemorate the victims of the school shooting in Parkland, Fla.
Here are seven things to know about the students’ rights:
Students keep their First Amendment rights while in school.
The 1969 case Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District established that students don’t give up their free-speech rights at school. The case centered on Mary Beth Tinker, a 13-year-old who wore a black armband to school with classmates in 1965 to protest the Vietnam War. The school suspended her and the others, but the U.S. Supreme Court held that the protest was allowed. Writing for the 7-2 majority, Justice Abe Fortas declared that students don’t shed their freespeech rights “at the schoolhouse gate.”
A schoolwide walkout might be disruptive, but it’s allowed.
Nevertheless, schools can discipline students who take part. The American Civil Liberties Union says that students risk punishments like suspension for missing classes but that schools can’t discipline students more harshly just because the protests are politically motivated. “Our hope is that students feel empowered by knowing what the rules are, what permissible school actions are, and that they can make the choices that are right for them,” said Esha Bhandari, an ACLU staff attorney.
If students leave, schools can bar them from re-entering.
Locking out students is the same as suspending them, so if a school’s rules allow suspension for missing class, being locked out may be part of the punishment. If suspension isn’t prescribed for unexcused absences, schools must let students back in.
Schools are all over the map about the planned walkout.
The Spring Independent School District near Houston told students that those who walk out could face in-school suspension, KHOU-TV reported. The district’s secondary school principals wrote that students should “show your support for the students in Florida in ways that won’t disrupt the school day.” In Milwaukee, Whitefish Bay High School let student organizers distribute a note announcing the protest will take place on the football field. Afterward, it said, “we will walk back to class silently, and as long as you are back in class by the start of fourth hour, there will be no disciplinary action taken,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
Social media protest postings could bring punishment.
Students have the same First Amendment rights on social media as in person, as long as the posts are made off campus and outside school hours — and don’t relate to school. But Bhandari said that a few schools have disciplined students for otherwise allowable social media postings and that a few courts have sided with schools, saying the posts were disruptive. In a few states, the ACLU has fought such rulings.
Younger students could face harsher penalties for protesting.
Actually, they could be punished for participating in the same kinds of protests older students can attend without punishment, because Tinker’s standard for whether speech is protected is based on whether it’s “disruptive.” Leaving a fourth-grade class, for instance, might be considered more disruptive than walking out of a high school civics class.
The First Amendment doesn’t apply to private schools.
The First Amendment doesn’t protect students from private schools’ disciplinary actions, because it limits only what government can do regarding free speech and the right to protest.