- Students have been organizing walk-out protests on either side of the river, prompting questions about what’s protected under the First Amendment
- There are have been several landmark Supreme Court cases outlining when schools can and cannot suppress student speech
- With the exception of one recent demonstration in North College Hill, the protests have been largely peaceful
In Covington, the walkout lasted about 15 minutes. Across the river at Western Hills High School, it was more like an hour. Others occurred at schools across Northern Kentucky and Cincinnati in mid-January, in conjunction with national protests.
The local scenes were mostly similar to those across the country, with one major exception:
These walkouts were organized and led by students during the school day.
“There’s been a lot of people are not agreeing with what ICE is doing, and personally, I don’t think what they’re doing is right,” said Donovan Marcario-Avila, one of the student organizers for the Newport walkout. “There’s a right way to do it. Obviously, we need to have immigration policy, but the same time, we need to take into consideration the impact we’re having on the immigrant community and just society as a whole.”
The Newport walkout occurred on Jan. 20, along with others throughout the country. The local protests LINK nky is aware of have been about ICE, and some students we talked to for this story expressed anxiety about themselves or their classmates ending up in danger, especially in the wake of the killings of Renee Good, Alex Pretti and Keith Porter.
“I think a good amount of students at the school have been very afraid that ICE is going to encroach upon here and do damage,” said Holmes High senior Jasper Jackson, who took part in a walkout in Covington on Feb. 12.
Beyond the content of the messaging at the protests, however, is another observation: Are students legally allowed to organize and conduct walkouts during the school day? If so, what’s the legal basis for it, and are there limits to it?
Student speech and the First Amendment
The First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech and peaceful assembly, but what does this mean for students?
The recent protests are not the first time that student speech has become a public issue, and there are a handful of Supreme Court cases that have established precedent as it relates to student speech.
One of the most well known is Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. The case came about when a group of students in Des Moines, Iowa, decided to wear black armbands to school to protest the Vietnam War. The district’s principals had learned about the students’ plans beforehand and preemptively banned armbands, but not other political paraphernalia. When some of the students wore the bands anyway, they were suspended.
The students’ families sued the district on First Amendment grounds in federal court, only to be defeated at both the trial court in 1966 and later at the appeals level. The families appealed again, this time to the Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the students in a 7 to 2 decision in 1969.
Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas, who became a justice under the Johnson administration in 1965, famously wrote with the majority that “it can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”
This came with some stipulations, though, which would later become known as the Tinker test for adjudicating if students’ speech could be suppressed or punished, namely if it would “materially and substantially interfere” with student discipline or operations at the school.
Two other later Supreme Court Cases established additional limits on student speech. One from 1988, Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, ruled that districts could censor student newspapers and publications but only if the publication was run by the school itself or occurred as part of a class. Materials produced by students off campus on their own were not subject to the same stricture.
A 2007 case, Morse v. Frederick, ruled that schools could censor materials advocating illegal drug use at school events after a student in Alaska displayed a banner with the words “BONG HiTS 4 JESUS” across the street from his high school during a school-sponsored viewing of the 2002 Olympic Torch Relay.
Marcario-Avila described how student organizers communicated with the district to ensure the students’ speech was lawful. For instance, students couldn’t make signs or other literature during the school day.
“They couldn’t encourage us or discourage us to do it,” Marcario-Avila said, “and it was up to us if we wanted to be a part of the walkout.”
Recent protests
The recent walkouts have been of varying length and size. There have been reports of counter protesting and arguments with people who disagreed with the students’ message, such as some that recently occurred at Lakota East, according to reporting from WVXU.
But for the most part, the protests have been peaceful, with one possible exception police are still investigating.
According to reporting from LINK nky partner WCPO, North College Hill students allegedly connected to a Thursday walkout entered a nearby Kroger and were video taped throwing objects and damaging property.
The North College Hill Police Department has not yet identified those in the video but said they will face criminal charges and school disciplinary action.
Within the bounds of what is safe and legal, Marcario-Avila encouraged students and other young people to speak out and get more civically involved.
“We need to become more informed of what’s going on in our policies and start showing up to city meetings, county meetings, and meeting with our local officials to address our concerns and what we want,” Marcario-Avila said. “We have community, and that’s really what is going to get us through the next couple years.”