Texas will suspend students who protest in support of Parkland

[Lotusflower70]

Link to tweet

[Luciferous]

1. My daughter graduated from high school last year, but if she was still in school I would

support her walking out to protest.

[Takket]

2. fine.........

then they can plan a large protest.......

outside the super's house....

at 2AM

[trof]

3. Please change you subject line.

Yes that sux, and of course it's Texas.
But at least (so far) it's ONE school district, not the entire state.
Give our Texans at least a small break?

[appalachiablue]

17. Agree, the school district should be noted in the header.

[nocalflea]

4. Suspension as badge of honor.

As he twirls his moustache adding "I dare you". Dude must be childless.

Go for it kids !

You can use the experience as fodder for the essay on your college application.

[poboy2]

20. Exactly! -eom

[ProudLib72]

5. The entire student body needs to protest

No one in class! If you're old enough to be killed by an assault rifle, you are old enough to protest without fear of reprisal. Fuck these assholes!

[TomSlick]

12. That's the answer. There is strength in numbers.

They can't suspend everyone.

[trc]

14. Since school districts are paid by the number of students they have in class in Texas

this becomes a financial burden on these districts...and therefore can have a real impact on decision making.

[ProudLib72]

15. October count?

I don't think a couple of days out of class would impact them financially; however, it might be good if the students learned to use that as a way to leverage the administration into taking protests seriously.

[trc]

18. The districts get paid for daily attendance,

not just numbers at a given point in the year. It is called ADA or Average Daily Attendance and can significantly impact yearly budgets. from the Texas Association of School Boards:

"ADA = Sum of Attendance Counts ÷ Days of Instruction.

So, if a student misses nine days during the 180-day school year, the district loses 5 percent of the funding a student with perfect attendance would generate.

ADA is not the same as enrollment. Enrollment is the total number of students signed up to attend the school. ADA reflects how often those enrolled students actually go to school.

The bottom line
Your school loses money when your child is absent. At the same time, the school must still pay for teacher and staff salaries, operations, building maintenance, electricity, and all the other expenses involved with running the school."

[ProudLib72]

23. Ok, Texas is different in that than CO

We only have October count. It's a big deal to get as many students in the classroom for the day that attendance is recorded and sent to the state for budget purposes. When my wife taught at a charter school with low attendance, there were some students who missed 90 days of school but still counted because they were there for October count.

[onecent]

6. Just move to Florida!!!

[Matthew28]

7. The right wing in

this country is down right fascist and don't like being challenged.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

8. They're trying to treat their students like Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys.

[LuckyCharms]

9. I'd take the suspension. n/t

[cloudbase]

10. They're worried about funding,

which is based on weighted average daily attendance.

[X_Digger]

11. Civil obedience has consequences. Why are some surprised?

The first amendment doesn't protect you from getting fired if your boss sees you on TV when you called in sick to protest, it doesn't stop schools from enforcing rules related to maintaining order. Students can be punished for disrupting class, even if it's for protected speech.

Think about it- if it were otherwise, then a religious nut could stand up all day and talk over the teacher without consequence, expounding on whatever bug crawled up their ass that day- planned parenthood, illuminati, new world order..

What schools can't do is place rules that infringe the first amendment that have no relationship to maintaining order. See Tinker, etc.

If you skip school, expect to be punished, however worthy the cause. Take it as a badge of honor- those who participated in civil disobedience in the 60's sure as shit did.

[shenmue]

13. The right of the people peaceably to assemble and petition the government for a redress of grievance

[TexasProgresive]

16. Please edit your title- It's one Texas school district, Needville (bright red) not all of Texas.

[Ken Burch]

19. I assume the ACLU is already drafting briefs on this.

n/t.

[loyalsister]

21. Right on!

Give them more time to protest. I hope they use it well.

[yuiyoshida]

22. I HOPE they all WALK OUT..what are they going to do?

Kick them all out of school?? IF so, fine, lose their fucking funding and shut down the fucking school.

[TeamPooka]

24. That gives them 3 more days to protest!