Housatonic junior Sophia Fitz organized a schoolwide protest on Friday, Jan. 30, in which students were invited to wear black or take a vow of silence to show their support for the Minnesota ICE protests.
The demonstration highlighted the political divides inside the school, prompting questions about division among the student body.
Over 70 students responded to a survey asking them to rank their political awareness and how politics affected them in school. The results show that, of the respondents, Housy students generally rank themselves as having high political awareness and generally care more about politics, but are more divided on how they feel within school.
Students were asked to rank things like political awareness, engagement, and how they feel affected by politics in school and on social media.
The first questions asked respondents to rank political awareness and how much they care about politics, with most students responding with a 4 or a 5.
One anonymous surveyor says, “I think people who think that politics should be kept completely out of school are using that as justification for ignoring having difficult conversations. It is our duty to make people aware of these types of things, even if they disagree.”
Next, students were asked how much other students’ posts on social media influence the political climate inside school, and whether this was generally more positive or negative.
Illustration by Peter Austin
The responses are relatively equal, and students that ranked influence as a 4 or 5 generally believed its influence to be much more negative than those that ranked it as a 3 or less.
Students were asked to rank the extent to which they felt that political issues affected the learning environment and their relationships with their classmates. Students generally feel like the learning environment is not very affected while remaining mostly neutral on whether it affects their relationships with their classmates.
“Teachers should be talking about politics more with all their students to make them aware,” says one anonymous responder.
The last question asked students if knowing somebody else’s political views changed how they viewed them.
Illustration by Peter Austin
These responses have the highest variability by far, with over 50% of responses greater than 3 and over 30% less than 3.
One anonymous respondent says, “I know some people’s lives [revolve] entirely around politics and refuse to be friends or associate with anybody with a different political view and I’m like dude it’s not that deep. I don’t care as long as someone’s agenda isn’t pushed into my face.”
Although it can sometimes be difficult to gain an understanding of a political climate, analyzing student actions and running surveys can give a good insight. Students at Housatonic are generally aware of political issues in the world, and these issues often influence how we interact both inside and outside of school.
