What Justifies Skipping School?

Anyone who thinks teachers are 'indoctrinating' kids hasn’t spent one minute trying to run a class.”

Late in my junior year of high school, the Seattle SuperSonics won the NBA Championship. I had made it all the way to the end of 11th grade without skipping a single class, but I told all my teachers I was not going to miss that parade and would be absent that day. Give me an unexcused absence for skipping, I told them, and I’ll be happy to face the consequences. They all responded (as did my parents) with a smile and comments like “Have a great time.” It helped that I was an A student, and that those consequences were negligible. But it was important to me, and I skipped school to take my place on that parade route in downtown Seattle. I was glad I did, and I’ll never forget it.

Just the other day — nearly 47 years later — I stood once again on a street corner a few blocks from where I had cheered the Sonics, surrounded by hundreds of thousands of happy Seahawks fans. A great many of them were high school kids, similarly unconcerned about missing class, because it was important to them. They had no doubt been encouraged, like I was, by adults who knew it was technically skipping but had no intention of meting out any but the minimum punishment. Seattle Public Schools had indeed announced that schools would be open, and students would be expected to be in class, with absences considered unexcused.

I’ve retold my victory parade stories hundreds of times, but not once did anyone ever say, “You should have gone to class! Education is more important! I pay taxes, and I want you in school!" But all these criticisms, and more, were leveled at the Peninsula High students who recently skipped a single period or two to protest in Purdy over the actions and behavior of ICE in our country.

Ah, but that’s political, you might say. Sure, it is. And politics is a touchier subject now than at any point in my lifetime (and yes, I was alive in the 1960s). But those kids showed up to protest because it was important to them. It was worth it for them to miss a period or two to exercise their free speech rights and make their feelings known to the community. And they faced the same consequences — an unexcused absence — for skipping class to protest.

It’s a sign of the times that, predictably, one’s own political opinions seem to dictate whether it was appropriate or not for kids to skip class to protest. Those who agreed with the students have been supportive, many enthusiastically. Those who did not agree found all sorts of criticisms to make, many of them quite unfair and unkind. It seems to me that before we decide to comment for or against the protests, we should ask ourselves: If they had been demonstrating in favor of ICE or the president, would we feel the same? And then temper our public comments accordingly.

Other charges levied against the student protest — those insisting the kids must have been put up to it by their teachers — were more pernicious.

I taught at PHS for 26 years, retiring in 2024. And I can tell you, from experience and from interviewing several students and adults from PHS this week, that such charges are blatantly false. Former colleagues told me things like “I wouldn’t touch that with a 10-foot pole,” and everyone I asked told me they hadn’t heard of any teacher who helped organize or openly encouraged the protest. And the kids told me the same. At the second demonstration, Feb. 13, I spoke to two of the students responsible for organizing the protests, and they denied any adult involvement, except for encouragement from their parents.

All this made perfect sense to me. Anyone who thinks teachers are “indoctrinating” kids hasn’t spent one minute trying to run a class. I couldn’t indoctrinate most of my kids into doing their homework, or getting off their phones, much less to take a political stand. And the school district, for its part, specifically told staff not to get involved. District officials told me they knew of none who had.

Because it was an off-campus activity not sanctioned by the school district, the same unexcused-absence policy was in place as it was for those who attended the Seahawks parade or any other non-school activity during the school day. And the district reminded students that, technically, it was school policy that any student who skips class is barred from riding the bus home that day. It’s difficult to enforce, but it has to be their policy.

Beyond these measures, the district cannot restrict student free-speech rights, any more than they can chain them to their desks. Those who expected the school to somehow force kids to stay in class simply don’t know how a modern public high school works. And the law is clearly established: students do not “leave their freedoms of speech and expression at the school door” (Tinker v. Des Moines, 1969). The only time school officials can punish or restrain student speech is when it disturbs or detracts from the educational environment of others (Bethel School District v. Fraser, 1986).

Whether you agree with their message or not, one thing is true about those students: they feel strongly about what they’re doing, and they are engaged. Personally, I prefer that to apathy, even if they pick “the other side.” I am proud of those students demonstrating in Purdy, just as I am proud of former students who have become conservative activists. All of those students care about their world, and about making it a better place, and I gotta love that.

And, ironically, there is one thing that most of us can agree on, and that is that politics is more important than sports.

Jonathan Bill taught history in Peninsula schools for 32 years. He lives in Wauna.