BY JANICE HART
ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico — In March and April, during and after the run-up to the US war on Iraq, the Albuquerque Public School (APS) District suspended five high school educators for having signs, flyers or student artwork about the invasion of Iraq in their classrooms or offices. In response, the Alliance for Academic Freedom has been formed.
In two classrooms, student-made signs expressed students' opinions about the war, but the principal said the pro-war signs were not "pro-war enough" and demanded that the student work be removed. The flyers were from a student peace group, which had previously been authorised by the school. One teacher had a "No war" sign facing out from her classroom.
Also, Bill Nevins — who is a regular contributor to Green Left Weekly and a teacher in the nearby Rio Rancho School District — was suspended, supposedly for not having the correct paperwork for a student field trip, after a student in his Write Club read an anti-war poem she wrote, to the school as part of the morning announcements. The Rio Rancho High School Poetry Slam Team was disbanded. (See <http://aaf.virtualactivism.net/nevins.htm>)
The APS school district docked these teachers from two-to-four days pay and placed letters of reprimand about their "insubordination" in their employee files. The district reinstated them for the time being, but two teachers on short-term contracts were not rehired for the next school year, and the Rio Rancho district asked Nevins to resign or be fired. The ACLU filed a suit on behalf of four of the educators, and a lawyer from the National Lawyers' Guild has filed suit on behalf of Nevins.
These suspensions placed academic freedom in jeopardy. Some principals directly advised teachers not to discuss the war. Although the schools were replete with pro-war materials and military recruiting at the time, no educator was similarly punished for displaying those.
Such actions deny free debate, which limits student learning, undercuts democratic citizenship and violates the policy and guidelines of the two school districts.
We knew we had to vigorously defend these teachers, much as the Hollywood 10 needed support during the 1950s. We realised that this could happen to any educator in the current political climate, in which even a hint of dissent is repressed.
So we called an open meeting, which was attended by educators, community members, parents and students and planned several initial forms of support: we attended all school board meetings and challenged board members about this action; we collected signatures and money to place an ad in the local paper; and we produced a fact sheet and a petition.
Although the local media printed misinformation about "teachers presenting a one-sided view", and although principals cited "anonymous complaints" as one justification for the teachers' suspensions, we feel that these teachers should be thanked for promoting critical thinking for their students and for providing the "marketplace of ideas" to which the US Supreme Court referred in a previous academic freedom case. Surely, a full discussion of ideas and views must be a hallmark of education in a democracy.
Currently, Bill Nevins needs a significant amount of money for legal fees. We are holding a large poetry event on September 14 in Albuquerque's historic Kimo Theatre. Also as the new school year starts, we are again calling together a group of teachers, students, parents and community members for further actions.
We will not stop until the letters of reprimand have been removed and the teachers' pay reinstated. These letters will make it difficult for them to find work elsewhere.
We uphold the right of teachers to foster democratic discussion of controversial ideas and issues. We'll be collecting donations online at <http://aaf.virtualactivism.net> and through snail mail to the Peace and Justice Center, 202 Harvard, SE, Albuquerque, NM 87106 (checks made out to Legal Counselling Services and marked "for the Alliance for Academic Freedom").
From Green Left Weekly, August 20, 2003.
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