Letters to the Editor
Letter to the Editor | Civics education in action
GHS and PHS students have organized an anti-ICE walkout and march. Predictably, some adults are losing their minds, demanding the schools shut it down immediately as if the students are being forcibly dragged into dissent.
Let’s be clear: these young adults are not chained to their desks. Peaceful protest is a fundamental right protected by the First Amendment. Freedom of assembly exists precisely so people can gather, march, and publicly express shared beliefs. Nowhere does the Constitution say those rights begin only after your 18th birthday. Students do not surrender their constitutional rights when they walk through the schoolhouse door.
Our legal system has long recognized this. Schools may regulate safety and disruption, but they cannot silence student speech simply because it is controversial or uncomfortable. Teaching young people that their voices only matter when they are quiet and compliant is not education.
Singing protest songs and chanting together is a form of collective expression that has united movements across generations. Songs like For What It’s Worth and Ohio gave my generation language for its outrage. Today’s artists do the same — Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny, for example, has used his platform to denounce immigration enforcement, famously shouting “ICE Out” at the Grammys.
Some critics argue that this walkout will damage students’ education. I’d argue the opposite: this is education. Civics isn’t learned by memorizing vocabulary words for a test; it’s learned by doing. These students are organizing, articulating beliefs, weighing consequences, and standing publicly behind their values. That lesson will last far longer than most of what they’ll cram for finals.
Be honest: 98% of them will never again need to wrangle a quadratic equation, but every one of them will live under the consequences of public policy and political power. This experience sharpens critical thinking and shows how dissent actually functions in a democracy. They’ll remember it for the rest of their lives.
Then there’s the pearl-clutching outrage: how dare the administration allow this expression of opinion? I’ve even seen calls to mark students’ “permanent records.” When I was a student, it loomed large yet not a single employer ever asked to see mine.
The hypocrisy is impossible to ignore. Some of the same voices now demanding punishment previously insisted schools allow elementary students to leave campus weekly for Bible school. Leaving class for religious instruction is apparently wholesome civic formation but leaving class to express political opinion is suddenly chaos.
You can’t teach democracy while suppressing dissent. You can’t praise freedom while punishing those who practice it. And you can’t claim to be “preparing students for the real world” while denying them the chance to engage with it.
What many critics conveniently ignore is that ICE raids are not theoretical policy debates for these students, they are lived reality. The targets are parents, siblings, and relatives of kids sitting in those classrooms right now. Some students come to school not knowing if their family will still be intact when they get home. Others have watched classmates disappear overnight after a raid, detention, or a hurried move to avoid one.
When students protest, they aren’t being “political.” They are responding to harm being done to people they know. Peaceful protest isn’t a failure of education. It’s proof that it’s working.
They’re not skipping class. March on, students!
George Young
Gig Harbor