MAQUOKETA, Iowa — A flag supporting the Black Lives Matter movement in a Maquoketa High School classroom has been determined by district administrators to represent a political expression. It was removed, but a flag supporting LGBTQ plus pride remains.
So how did the school district make the decision?
A parent complained earlier this school year after a teacher displayed both a Black Lives Matter flag and an LGBTQ+ flag in their classroom.
When this happened, the Maquoketa Community School District began reviewing current policies and implementing a new employee expression policy. The new employee expression policy resulted in the BLM flag being taken down.
The school board had been debating their decision since the fall of 2022, but the board ultimately decided to follow the Iowa Association of School Boards' employee expression policy in a decision made earlier this month.
The guidelines they used when making their decision asks these questions:
- Does the flag display or represent an organization or an individual?
- Does it urge political action?
- Does the flag or display support a political party or candidate?
- Are the words displayed historically supporting a political party?
Based on these guidelines, the board said that BLM is considered a political organization, therefore violating the policy.
"It's really about providing that neutral ground," said MCSD Superintendent Tata Notz. "If someone presents a Black Lives Matter flag, what would be another viewpoint? What are ways to get across the same message of what we believe in, but wouldn't be considered necessarily political."
Because public schools are a government entity, teachers' First Amendment rights are limited. According to the University of Iowa Law Professor Todd Pettys, generally, when a teacher works for a public school, everything in the classroom represents a message that the district supports.
"You may have a Maquoketa teacher who has got a great heart and is trying to do great things with her kids, and maybe is doing things that are just terrifically smart education policy," Pettys said. "But she does not have a First Amendment right to say, 'I'm going to run my classroom, I'm going to teach my students in the way I see fit.' She instead is an agent of the government. Her job is to speak on behalf of the government. And if the government, even if they're being foolish when they make the decision, if the government does not like the way she's doing her job when she speaks, they don't have to tolerate it."
Pettys said that public school teachers may still be able to express political beliefs on personal items, like a t-shirt or a pen. However, because school districts are government entities, they may be able to force teachers to remove those items as well.
The MCSD also considered removing the right to display pride flags in the classroom, but they've made the decision to allow them for now.
The MCSD has yet to release the new expression policy to the public.
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