Kansas public high schools need more free speech, not less, in these contentious times

Lawrence High School students and residents protest Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Jan. 27, 2026, at 19th and Louisiana Street across from the high school. (Photo by Maya Smith for Kansas Reflector)

When it comes to constitutional protection for the speech of high school students, too many lawmakers care too much about scoring partisan points with their constituents and not nearly enough about the educational importance of student speech as we prepare students for adulthood and citizenship.

Consider what recently happened in Kansas, where high school students across the state walked out of their classes to protest ICE raids in their cities, with schools in Johnson County — such as Olathe and Shawnee Mission — serving as the primary locations. High school students also protested in Lawrence, Wichita and Topeka as well.

In response, the state Legislature now requires students to obtain parental permission to leave campus during school hours to attend a rally or protest. Furthermore, high schools that do not enforce the new law are subject to huge fines.

Legislators overrode Gov. Laura Kelley’s line-item veto to push the restriction into law. It’s difficult to believe they were indifferent to the fact that the high school students who had walked out of their high schools were protesting ICE, not picketing an abortion clinic. Doctrinally, this is known as viewpoint discrimination, when the government favors one viewpoint over another.

College students at the University of Kansas also engaged in such protests. Unlike concerns about censorship on college campuses, which have received plenty of news media and scholarly attention, few people care nearly as much about the extent to which state lawmakers, school boards, and administrators may suppress the ideas of students who are younger.

The assumption is that due to their age and relative immaturity, most of what they contribute to the marketplace of ideas at their school will have little, if any, value. Also, what students say or write may disrupt the education environment. As such, officials behave as though teenagers should not be able to exercise the same free speech rights that college students may exercise.

However, this double standard is unjustified.

For free speech purposes, a junior high or high school does not differ nearly enough from a public university to warrant such different constitutional treatment. That is the argument that I make in my new book, “Education in Democracy: The Importance of Free Speech in American Public Schools.”

There are many ways to defend the practice of free speech in this context. My focus is on how educational the experience can be. An important part of becoming a citizen in a democracy calls for learning how to deal with the partisan divisions and intractable political disagreements that characterize contemporary American society.

Students cannot learn to value free speech when lawmakers treat their speech with contempt, denying them opportunities to practice their deliberative skills to improve them.

In fact, there should be as much, if not more, protection for free speech in this context, considering where students are on the learning curve. School authorities must respect students’ autonomy by allowing them to express themselves on campus during school hours or off campus using social media — even if their speech disrupts the school day (any violence is of course unfortunate, and measures should be taken to prevent it). After all, the exercise of free speech rights never has been, and never will be, cost-free.

To learn how to be autonomous citizens in a democracy, students must be allowed to express themselves in political activities as well. This autonomy-enhancing approach is particularly well-suited for those who must learn as soon as possible — before it is too late — that censorship is not the answer to ideas they find disagreeable or offensive.

Paternalistic defenses of censorship of student speech do not work. Teenagers do not need to be protected from “bad” or “dangerous” viewpoints, particularly when they are not far from adulthood.

Rather, they need to learn how to become more resilient, independent, and tolerant. Respect for the autonomy of each student on the part of school authorities requires a strong presumption in favor of protecting student speech so that they can become the kind of citizen that a democracy requires.

School and government officials must allow students to discuss anything that concerns them in an educational institution like a public school, stimulating their intellectual curiosity and encouraging them to be more informed about politics and other matters of public concern.

In an environment hostile to the exercise of free speech rights, students will self-censor, become risk averse and lack the courage of their convictions to challenge abuses of political authority.

The traditional constitutional remedy for “bad” speech is counter speech, that is, not censorship by a school or state Legislature, but “good” speech from others (where “good” and “bad” are in the eyes of the beholder). That is the most constitutionally and morally appropriate remedy when school authorities or state legislators cannot be trusted to police ideas.

When government censors students’ speech or makes it harder for them to be politically active, it discourages young people from doing exactly what they should learn how to do sooner rather than later. Their classmates should also be free to engage in counter protests if they want to support ICE. As educational institutions, schools must encourage all students to speak their minds, regardless of their viewpoint, especially when they criticize what a government agency is doing.

What Kansas lawmakers did was probably politically expedient. But it was not principled, which is what a commitment to free speech requires in a democracy like our own.

Ronald C. Den Otter is a professor of political science at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. Through its opinion section, Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.