In September, Montgomery County executive Marc Elrich wrote the MCPS School Board and Superintendent Jack Smith urging them to excuse students attending a climate rally in Washington D.C. The protest was a part of the Global Climate Strike in which more than 150 countries gathered to protest government inaction regarding climate change. MCPS responded to Elrich stating that though the school district supports student advocacy, students who want to participate in the civic process should do so while at school. More recently, Montgomery County state and local leaders wrote a letter appealing to the Board of Education to consider excusing students who participate in organized protests and civil action. The Board of Education’s Policy Management Committee is reviewing the request letter and is set to meet this month.

Advocate Advocacy 

by Anjali Verma ‘20

Yes. Protests should count as excused absences. Many areas around Montgomery County, including DC and the Virginia counties of Arlington and Fairfax, already grant excused absences to students who want to attend protests and rallies. MCPS telling students who want to participate in the civic process to do so while at school goes against the exact purpose of organized protest. Staying at school does not emphasize the message of discontent and need for change. Students, who are the future of the nation, are the ones most heavily impacted by climate change and other issues, including gun violence. 

As the local leaders put it in their letter to MCPS, “The research is clear: Civic engagement teaches higher-order skills—including critical thinking, writing, technology, and coalition building—at more advanced levels of aptitude. These skills will serve our students well not only in college and their careers, but throughout their lives, making them engaged citizens capable of advocating for what they believe in.” Events like protests help students to apply what they have learned to the world as a whole. 

Time after time, MCPS refuses to accept protests as excused absences. This occurred in 2018 when thousands of students walked out of their schools to protest lack of gun control legislation as organized by March 4 Our Lives. Though directly impacting the lives of students and bringing lots of positive awareness to the issue, their absences were marked unexcused. Students should have a few days a year allocated to advocacy. These absences could be proved through providing parental consent, evidence of attendance to the event, and summary of the attendance, all compiled in a sort of report. This way, students gain reflection from their experiences while also providing reason to their absence. Students should be allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights and fight for a better world with support, not consequences, that hold them back. 

Unexcused Absences Make a Statement

by Vendela Krenkel ’20

Although many student activists may feel dismayed or discouraged upon seeing their day spent striking marked as unexcused, they may not realize the profound impact this has on the officials they seek to send a message to by protesting in the first place. Absences, especially those in great numbers as often occur during walkouts, disrupt classroom instruction, and this is the greatest power a student has in sharing their voice.

Students should, of course, feel empowered to stand for their beliefs, but a wave of unexcused absences on a walkout day, like the climate strikes in September, cause a ripple in administration that makes its way upward in the chain of command. Just as adults across the world left work without permission from their employer to make a political statement, so too do students who are willing to sacrifice a day of classes without an excused absence, making their plea for change resonate even louder.

Logistically, a plan to excuse absences on days of protests may be difficult to institute  and may not be able to fulfill the extent of some students’ political expression. For example, one important detail of the original bill proposed by Elrich is that not every protest would be excused; they must first be approved by the principal and have permission from the protest’s organization. Because of this, smaller protests, potentially student-led, may see less turnout because a principal may not see enough support for these to deem them worthy to miss class time. While these criteria were eventually removed by legislators due to the possibility of bias on the principals’ parts and unnecessary complications with the institution backing each strike, county lawmakers have yet to propose a new way to determine what MCPS will deem excused.