Students fight for the right to protest

Security officer Andrea Bell processes tardy students at Oak Park and River Forest High School. Students upset by the school's new system for handling latecomers staged a May 4 protest that turned rowdy. (Chuck Berman, Chicago Tribune / May 12, 2010)


By Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah, Tribune reporter
May 23, 2010



When students protested a crackdown on tardiness at Oak Park and River Forest High School, school officials dispersed the crowd within minutes, called police to a second planned sit-in and threatened to take away seniors' rights to prom and graduation.

Similarly, in West Chicago, school officials quickly quashed a middle school rally over the cancellation of a school play. Seventh and eighth graders were threatened with disciplinary action and were ordered to remove their costumes — prom dresses and tuxedos — because they were disrupting "the learning environment."

"We're studying the Constitution this year, and we knew we had a constitutional right to protest," said eighth grader Korrin Gladwin, 14, of West Chicago. "We felt like (school officials) should be listening to us. They were treating us like we were just a bunch of robots to be ordered around."

Students may be learning about First Amendment rights to free speech and participation in democracy, but they often find that when they exercise those rights in school, their fledgling movements are crushed.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/education/ct-met-student-protest-bd-20100522,0,3433285.story