An administrator at a Wisconsin high school is getting pushback from students, alumni and others for barring staff from displaying BLM and "pride" flags and other controversial items in classrooms. Kettle Moraine Superintendent Stephen Plum argues he's just reaffirming an existing policy, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
American Family News spoke with Julaine Appling of the Wisconsin Family Council, who says this has to do with a lawsuit parents filed against the school's gender-transition policy.
"[The school] is trying to put something in place like that so they can say, well, we have this policy," Appling argues. "[They want to say] we don't allow anyone to display any religious or political paraphernalia in their classrooms – so, therefore we're not promoting a particular ideology."
Two high school students in the district – who describe themselves as "part of the LGBTQIA+ community" – initiated an online petition challenging the ban on pride flags and pronoun usage. That petition argues "a pride flag is not a political thing" and that "pro-nouns [sic] are a part of English class."
At press time, slightly more than 12,000 signatures have been gathered. Appling, however, dismisses the petition.
"I don't put any stock at all in what the students are expressing through this petition," she tells AFN. "That is not who the school administrators and school personnel are responsible to."
School Board president Gary Vose backs the decision, which was first announced on the district's Facebook page on July 27.
