‘Pain And Sorrow’: California Students Stage A Walkout After School Board Won’t Fly The Pride Flag
Reagan Reese on May 31, 2023
A few hundred students at two California high schools walked out of class Tuesday after a school board decided Pride flags would not be flown during June 2023, according to ABC 10 News.
On Thursday, Carlsbad Unified School Board voted 3-2 to delay its decision until the summer on whether the school district can fly the rainbow flags during June, a month LGBTQ people use to celebrate their gender identity and sexual orientation, according to ABC 10 News. Students protested the school board’s delay, saying that flying a Pride flag would show LGBTQ students that the school is “safe.”
“I think it’s important to have the flag raised in the schools during Pride month because it will help show students like myself, a part of the LGBTQ community, that they feel represented seeing it and that they’re walking into a space where they feel safe,” Talia Baird, a student within the district, told the outlet.
The school board pushed its decision back because it needs to draft a policy detailing how it will handle requests to fly flags before permitting the Pride flag to be flown during June, ABC 10 News reported.
“Our first priority is to ensure student safety,” Benjamin Churchill, Carlsbad Unified School District superintendent, told the outlet. “We’re pleased to hear that the student-organized walkouts were peaceful [Tuesday] morning, with minimal disruptions to student learning. We’re told that students returned to class after the 10 am walkouts at Carlsbad High and Sage Creek High, and that the focus at both schools continues to be on getting ready for next week’s final exams and commencement ceremonies.”
Throughout the country, school districts are implementing different LGBTQ initiatives; in Wisconsin, a school district hung numerous transgender, sexual orientation and gender identity flags to support students and faculty in the LGBTQ community. A school district in New Hampshire spent thousands of dollars in COVID-19 relief funds on a youth pride event that included a drag queen performance.
“So many kids outed themselves and shared their stories of pain and sorrow just to get them to listen to us and then they didn’t even discuss it,” Kayley Teagle, a senior within the district, said about the California school board meeting.
Carlsbad Unified School District did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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