(This is the third post in a four-part series. You can see Part One and Part Two .)
The new question-of-the-week is:
What are the best ways to respond when teachers are told we should keep politics out of the classroom?
In , Dr. Angela M. Ward, Holly Spinelli, Rocio del Castillo, Ed.D., and Keisha Rembert shared their responses. Angela, Holly, Rocio, and Keisha also were guests on my . You can also find a list of, and links to,
In , Abeer Shinnawi, Jennifer Hitchcock, Matt Renwick, and Leah B. Michaels added to the conversation.
Today, Jen Schwanke, Dr. Carolyn M. Shields, Timothy Hilton, and Bill Ivey contribute their commentaries.
鈥淧olitics are part of everything we do鈥�
Ms. Jen Schwanke has served as a teacher and administrator at the elementary and middle school levels for 20 years. She has established her voice in school leadership by contributing frequently to literacy and leadership publications and has presented at multiple conferences at the state and national level. She is the author of the book, You鈥檙e the Principal! Now What? Strategies and Solutions for New School Leaders, published by ASCD:
Keeping politics out of the classroom is like keeping the water out of rain.
After all, what is politics if not a gathering of debatable opinions and perspectives from a group of people?
And what is school if not a place to consider opinions and perspectives of others?
Politics is part of everything we do. Even when we think it isn鈥檛 there? Well, yes, it is. Much like other things we can鈥檛 see or accurately define鈥攔acism, classism, elitism, love, hate鈥�"politics鈥� is layered with meaning, emotion, and history.
I recently wrapped up teaching a graduate school class titled Curriculum Development and Instruction. My entire syllabus was waylaid mid-semester when I asked the class, 鈥淲hat are your thoughts about politics and curriculum?鈥� Several class sessions later, we were still discussing the topic, immersed and engaged in relentlessly thought-provoking conversation led by some frustrated but articulate social studies teachers. As a group, they said, 鈥淲e facilitate student thinking. We interject facts, as we know them, from history. We rely on journalism that鈥檚 been vetted and historically sound.鈥� Yet, they鈥檇 seen an uptick in parent challenges in recent years because of things they鈥檇 allegedly said. A comment from a student and, then, the teacher鈥檚 effort to offer a bipartisan perspective, could spiral quickly, become fodder at someone鈥檚 dinner table, and end up as a fierce phone call to the principal about the political leanings of the teacher.
When teachers are told to keep politics out of the classroom, it is usually related to someone鈥檚 version of a misstep directly tied to a specific topic, book, conversation, person, or assignment. When challenged, it鈥檚 time for both 鈥渟ides鈥� to do some asking and answering. Here is a way teachers can respond, either in an inner audit for themselves or to respond to others:
What is the educational purpose of the conversation?
Is there alignment to curriculum standards?
Are there multiple, diverse perspectives being provided as part of this work?
Does this discussion support open, valid social, emotional, or academic needs in the classroom community?
Is there evidence that student responses and engagement reveal creativity, curiosity, and independent thought?
Does it foster a depth of understanding about the world?
What are the specific concerns behind the request (or demand) to keep politics out of the classroom? Are the concerns partisan in nature?
Is there a formal process to handle complaints of this nature?
- What does our board of education policy say?
It鈥檚 no secret that teasing out fact from fiction is terribly muddy these days, and there doesn鈥檛 seem to be an end to it. But challenges can quickly lose traction when the response is based on a cool, clinical, policy-based approach and remains bipartisan.
As I told my class, 鈥淚t鈥檚 never about who we vote for. It鈥檚 about how we think.鈥�
鈥淲e must take up controversial issues鈥�
Dr Carolyn M. Shields is a professor of educational leadership at Wayne State University in Detroit. Her teaching and research have been widely acclaimed for their emphasis on the provision of inclusive, equitable, excellent, and socially just education for all. Her recent work includes the companion books Transformative Leadership in Education (2017) and Becoming a Transformative Leader (2020), both published by Routledge:
When people say it is necessary to keep politics out of education, they are usually thinking about the negative connotations associated with partisan politics, and it is generally appropriate for educators not to advocate for or against any particular party or person. However, Title 1 of the Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015 begins: ''The purpose of this title is to provide all children significant opportunity to receive a fair, equitable, and high-quality education, and to close educational achievement gaps鈥欌�� (sec.1001). Achieving these goals necessitates political acts that include determining what comprises a fair or equitable or high-quality education.
Paulo Freire, scholar, community developer, and former secretary of education for Sao Paulo, Brazil, believes that 鈥渁ll education is political鈥� and that 鈥渢eaching is never a neutral act.鈥� Hence, he suggests that we must teach students to both 鈥渞ead the word and read the world.鈥� Basic literacy alone is not enough. Students also have to learn to think critically about the world in which they live and about who benefits and who is disadvantaged by current policies and practices.
Neutrality is itself a political choice and one that leads to ignoring and marginalizing the fears, insights, and circumstances of many students. Providing a fair, equitable, and high-quality education requires us to examine for whom education is not at the moment fair or equitable. Fulfilling the multiple goals of education is political as this involves preparing students for citizenship, cultivating a skilled workforce, and teaching students to think critically.
Understanding and closing educational achievement gaps are political activities as they force awareness of how opportunity gaps and resource gaps negatively affect the ability of some students to succeed. This requires educators to take responsibility for the education of all children without blaming those whose circumstances or home lives may be less conducive to supporting educational achievement than others. No child wants to be poor or hungry or homeless although these are political situations, socially constructed and maintained by current policies and practices. Educators need to understand how conditions like these arise and how to support children from various circumstances and situations. Closing educational achievement gaps requires educators to make the sometimes controversial decision not to treat every child in the same way. Instead, it requires educating children with varying needs and from diverse circumstances by adopting different resources, approaches, and supports. These are political decisions.
To prepare students to become participating and engaged citizens, educators have to first acknowledge their own responsibility for teaching all children. They must become aware of how their own social positions influence the ways in which they understand the curriculum and how they choose to interact with students and families. By teaching only superficial 鈥渇acts鈥� but not ways to understand and interpret them, teachers do individuals and society a disservice.
In order not to shortchange students, we must introduce various perspectives and positions and help sstudents to choose among options. We must take up controversial issues like racism, sexism, homophobia, or xenophobia, or inherently political topics such as gun control or climate change and encourage a thorough exploration of the origins and outcomes, disadvantages and benefits of perpetuating current positions. We must help students to identify the underlying ideological perspectives of textbooks and curricular material, including which social groups鈥� positions are supported and whose are silenced or marginalized. And we must help students reflect deeply on how the status quo is perpetuated or how it may be changed.
In short, educators who are admonished to keep politics out of the classroom can respond by affirming that they will avoid advocating a particular person or party, but that to uphold the laws and Constitution of the United States, they must help students understand how to support policies and practices that create a more perfect union of mutual benefit for all.
鈥淪peak to the benefits of talking about politics鈥�
Timothy Hilton is a climate and culture specialist with the Fresno Unified school district where he coaches teachers on classroom management and class climate. Timothy has over 10 years of classroom teaching experience at every level of social studies ranging from Advanced Placement to English-language development. Timothy is currently a doctoral candidate at Claremont Graduate University in the field of educational policy, evaluation, and reform:
Dealing with politics in the classroom is very tricky. Our role as educators is not to be one of indoctrination but instead to be one of enlightening. This is where having political conversation comes into play. The truth is, we must have these conversations to best prepare our students for their post-schooling world.
We are living in a highly politicized time. Politics has infiltrated every aspect of our life. To pretend it does not exist in our classroom is quite frankly not just a disservice to our students, but it is in fact dangerous. While we may feel as though our classroom is a nice little insulated bubble, it is not. Our classroom is just one part of our students鈥� lives. It is just one facet that they must navigate. Meanwhile, when our students are not in our classroom, they are navigating the rest of their world. A world filled with unknowns, a world that they will have questions about, a world that can be very scary. This is where we come in.
Our students come to us with concerns because they know they can trust us. They will come to us with questions because for many of them we are the only college-educated people in their lives. They will come to us because our experience is different from theirs. This is a responsibility we cannot take lightly.
Now to the crux of the question. How should a teacher respond when told to keep politics out of the classroom. This question comes with some other issues that need to be considered. Issues like student grade, content matter, and the political topic itself. Another piece to consider is who is telling the teacher to keep politics out of the classroom. Is it the administration or is this a fellow teacher?
The short answer is, 鈥淣o, I will not keep politics out of the classroom,鈥� assuming you feel comfortable talking politics. But to be more diplomatic, the best way I can think to respond to the statement is by looking back to the earlier paragraphs in this essay. Speak to the benefits of talking about politics. Speak to the role we play as educators in preparing our students to be civic-minded and be sure to explain what you will do to make political conversation meaningful.
Couple tips to meaningful political conversations:
1) As a teacher, try to remain as impartial as possible and take a near-clinical approach.
2) Seek to provide pros & cons for both sides. This will let students make up their own mind.
3) Structure political conversations in a way that ensures all voices are heard and everyone feels safe.
4) Highly charged conversations (abortion being the best example) should be handled with far more delicacy, possibly utilizing counseling staff or outside stakeholders.
It is important when dealing with the question of politics in the classroom that we as teachers take great care to allow our students to make up their own mind. We represent a gatekeeper for many students, and it is crucial we take this role and use it to best prepare our students rather then shelter or indoctrinate.
鈥淧olitics is in classrooms whether or not we want it to be鈥�
Bill Ivey teaches Humanities 7, French 1, and rock band in an independent boarding/day school for students in grades 7-12:
Let鈥檚 face it, politics is in classrooms whether or not we want it to be, whether or not we think of it that way. All decisions affecting content are political. We study governments and their systems. And of course, politics affects our everyday lives in ways that don鈥檛 magically cease to exist when we enter class.
So one obvious response to being told to keep politics out of the classroom is to ask, 鈥淗ow exactly would that look?鈥� And then the real conversation would start.
If it鈥檚 just a matter of not telling which candidates I support, that鈥檚 easy. My standard response if asked is that I vote based on my values, which include dignity as a basic human right for all people, and that my ballot is secret.
As for all the rest, I would talk about my Humanities 7 students鈥� reactions to Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie鈥檚 TED talk, 鈥溾�� and their immediate and intuitive understanding of the need to push past a dominant narrative. How we use Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop鈥檚 鈥溾�� as a lens through which to examine the stories that enter our classroom, actively seeking and checking for diversity of perspective.
I鈥檓 delighted that my school recently adopted the four-pronged of , expanding our broad and specific curricular focus beyond skills and intellect to include identity, and criticality, the study of systems of power, privilege, and oppression and the resistance to and disruption of those systems.
So, we establish facts. We examine perspectives on those facts. We consider possible actions to take. And in those discussions, I insist on respect for basic human dignity for all people of all identities.
Those are the politics in my classroom. I鈥檓 good with that.
Thanks to Jen, Carolyn, Timothy, and Bill for their contributions!
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