In the time honored tradition of fixing the barn door after the cow has come home, I present a post about politics and the classroom the day after the US presidential election. I am writing this post weeks before Election Day and I plan to resist the urge to revise it no matter the outcome of November 5, 2024.
In prior presidential election years, the schools in which I have served have approached engaging with political events in widely varied ways. There was a year in which the staff was directed to not discuss anything political, even among themselves as professionals (political conversations that year were referred to as “sweater conversations” as in “your sweater looks nice” or “your sweater looks like it will hasten the end of democracy.”). There was a year that the entire school took a day out of the curriculum to engage on the mechanics of American elections, inviting guest speakers, hosting a parade of delegates, and holding a mock election. There was the year the entire cycle seemed to be ignored.
I think educators can over-think our approach to elections. This is no surprise. Educators can overthink approaches to anything. Elections in schools do not need to be overthought.
I believe a number of things about how schools, especially high schools, should approach elections.
We have to follow the mission of our schools.
Sometimes, the mission of our schools will call us to wade into politically charged, hot-button topics more than we might have liked. That is the cost of doing business in mission-oriented contexts.
We have a responsibility to teach and model respectful discourse.
This is incumbent upon us in all years, not just in election years.
We have a responsibility to keep our personal politics personal.
Teachers, counselors, and coaches have too much influence over students to share their personal politics.
We have a responsibility to educate our students about how American elections work.
If we are not going to teach our students what it means to vote and how elections work, who will?
Should we talk about issues? Yes, we should. Should we help students who are 18 register to vote? Yes, we should. Should we speak about what an awesome responsibility we have as Americans? Yes, we should. Should we honor the American democratic process in our approach to elections? Yes, we must.
As I noted earlier, I wrote this post weeks prior to the 2024 election. I wonder if I will be proud of or disappointed in how I led my school to engage with the election this year. Time will most certainly tell.