Colorado High School Bans Flags

[Annie]

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_3661451

Immigration ire prompts flag ban at high school
By Jim Hughes
Denver Post Staff Writer


Skyline High School in Longmont (St. Vrain Valley schools)

A group of students at Longmont's Skyline High School mounted a protest outside the school Friday to denounce their principal's decision to stop them from displaying the American flag.

Skyline principal Tom Stumpf issued a ban on all flags after seeing American flags used to taunt and harass students demonstrating in support of immigrants' rights, he said. The school has seen tension mirroring the national argument over immigration reforms being considered by Congress and at the state legislature, he said.

The ban applies to all flags, not just the American flag, Stumpf said in an interview with 7News. The district's American flags are still flying at Skyline and all other district facilities, according to the release.

"The flags were being used not as a symbol of cultural heritage, but the flags were being used as symbols of bigotry, a symbol of hostility," he said. "They were being used to inflame different groups, and we're just simply not going to tolerate that."

Stumpf told the station "one flag was thrown into the face of another group, and another flag was being brandished in front of another group."

In a release from the office of Superintendent Randy Zila, St. Vrain Valley School District officials cited a districtwide policy allowing "individuals" to display the U.S. flag "as long as such display does not disrupt the educational process or cause a safety concern."

Officials said the district "respects the professional judgment and discretion of those who are close to the situation and who have a better understanding of the emotions that are running very high this week among the students at Skyline High School," according to the release.

But officials will review the situation over the spring break recess, which began at the end of the school day Friday, they said.

The students demonstrating Friday said it felt as if Stumpf's ban applied only to American flags, which they had brought to school to counter Mexican flags displayed by other students on school grounds all week.

"What we want to know is, since when was it against the rules to have an American flag on a car, in a car, in your hands in a school?" student William Cassity said to 7News.

Two state lawmakers weighed in from their shared office at the Capitol on Friday with e-mails criticizing Stumpf's flag rule.

"Be prepared for legislative action and legal action against you to follow," wrote Republican Sen. Steve Johnson of Fort Collins.

His office mate, Sen. Tom Wiens, R-Castle Rock, said in an interview that Stumpf should have found some other way to ease the tensions in his school.

"Clearly, there are ways ... to manage any sort of conflict that students might have that don't diminish the respect that we should have for the flag," Wiens said.

 

[William Joyce]

Some would say that the day they ban the American flag in America, America has ceased to exist. But that would be just a bunch of sour grapes, right? Onward to our bright Third-World future! Flags of Guatemala for everyone!

P.S., I wonder if this jerkwad principal ever served, or had a relative who did. Somehow, I doubt it.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

We're all global citizens now! Yippee! The year is one!

 

[insein]

"Fine if you cant play with it nice, then NO ONE CAN PLAY WITH IT!!"

I hated when parents said that to siblings when the one only antagonized the other just so they would both be miserable.

Complete Bullshit. This is America. If we were in Iran and i was waving an American flag around, i'd expect retribution. But this is America. I'd personally tell this principle "Fuck You, pal" right to his face and carry an American flag all day to every class.

 

[BATMAN]

I wonder if students will walk out of classes and block traffic over this.