This semester, thousands of students across Kansas — including Johnson County — have walked out of class to protest the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration.
The demonstrations caught the attention of lawmakers in Topeka, who are now trying to enact legislation that would penalize K-12 school districts when students walk out.
Proponents of the regulations say students should protest outside of school hours and that school districts should be doing more to restrict students from participating during the school day.
Those opposed argue the students are exercising their First Amendment right to free speech.
Either way, student organizers of the protests say the legislation won’t stop them, as they’ve seen their classmates discussing immigration more since the walkouts and because the fear of ICE locally is still there.
Sydney Mwangi, a senior who helped organize the walkout at Olathe North, says she’s not deterred.
“I stand for what I believe in, no matter the consequences,” she said.
Kansas lawmakers want to penalize students and districts for walkouts
The Kansas Senate earlier this month passed a budget amendment aimed at discouraging walkouts.
The proposal says that students would need parental consent to participate. It also would fine school districts the salary of their superintendent for each day that staff facilitates or encourages protests or fails to discipline students.
Sen. Beverly Gossage, a Republican whose district covers parts of western Johnson County, said the amendment is “not a matter of free speech.”
“They have plenty of time to do something like this after school, no matter what they’re protesting,” she said at the hearing.
Gossage brought up a fight that occurred at a walkout at Olathe Northwest, which is in her legislative district, as part of the reason for her support of the bill.
“Students were out during the school time, in protest, and became violent,” she said. “I don’t think this is the kind of thing that anybody would want. I can’t imagine a parent would want something like that.”
Senate Minority Leader Dinah Sykes, a Lenexa Democrat, criticized the budget amendment, saying it violates the students’ First Amendment rights.
“This is the majority party telling ‘free speech for me,’ and it’s ‘not free speech for you,’ ” Sykes said at the hearing.
As debate continues in Topeka, Johnson County students who talked to the Post for this story said the measure, if it becomes law, wouldn’t stop them from organizing future demonstrations.
“Punishment will not scare me from standing up for what I believe in,” said Mwangi of Olathe North.
Junior Avery Hoppock at Shawnee Mission North echoed that sentiment.
“Everyone who participates understands they’re engaging in civil disobedience,” she said. “That’s part of it.”
Shawnee Mission East sophomore Hudson Terreros said a law like that could only empower students more.
“I think it shows people are paying attention,” he said.
Mwangi recited the famous quote of unknown origin that has risen in popularity among protesters in the past several months: “When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty.”
The proposal still needs to pass the Kansas House. Then, it would need to be signed by Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly to become law, which is unlikely, meaning it could then have to pass a veto override vote.
Hundreds of students have walked out of JoCo public schools
The walkouts followed reports of increased federal immigration and customs enforcement activity in the Kansas City area, including at least two incidents that garnered community attention in Olathe last month.
Student organizers told the Post that they walked out of school to voice their own outrage, not just over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement crackdown, but also to exercise their First Amendment rights, even as many parts of the U.S. are still reeling from the at-times violent clashes between ICE agents and protesters in other cities.
At Shawnee Mission North, Hoppock said she has noticed more interest in student activism since about 300 students walked out and marched along Johnson Drive last month.
“I’ve gotten DMs from people saying, ‘We should do another one,’” she said. “I think it planted a seed. People are realizing we can do something.”
At Olathe North, however, Mwangi said the momentum for continued action doesn’t seem as strong.
“For some people, it might have been a one-time thing,” Mwangi said. “When it comes to follow-up, it kind of dies down.”
Immigration enforcement hits particularly close to home for Olathe North students, whose boundary includes neighborhoods that have seen ICE activity.
On Feb 13., an employee of the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Kansas City in Olathe saw ICE agents peering into the building’s windows and walking around the surrounding neighborhoods. Dozens of immigrant rights advocates and volunteers gathered outside the facility to deter ICE agents from returning.
The next day, video circulated of ICE agents detaining a teenage boy in a Walmart parking lot — just two miles from the Boys & Girls Club. The video shows an officer handcuffing him and pinning him to the pavement.
Mwangi said ICE’s presence in Olathe is still on students’ minds, especially at her school, where many students come from immigrant families.
“It’s something we think about,” she said. “Maybe not fear every day, but it’s there.”
The three organizers the Post spoke with said school administrators haven’t said anything about the walkouts. Instead, they’ve received backlash from their classmates who may have disagreed with the demonstration.
At Shawnee Mission North, Hoppock said some students expressed concern that a large protest like the one last month could make the school a target for ICE.
“There were people who didn’t want to protest because they felt it might put others at risk,” she said. “And I understand that perspective.”
Terreros, who helped organize Shawnee Mission East’s walkout last month, said he’s been harassed by some students.
“Afterwards, walking through the halls, I would get weird glances,” he said. “Of course, people would say things to me. I get food thrown at me at lunch.”
About 15 Shawnee Mission East students protested the anti-ICE walkout last month, waving Trump flags and driving around the school.
A walkout at Olathe Northwest on Feb. 20 led to the arrests of four students after a fight broke out between protesters and counter protesters.
What district policies say across Johnson County
In response to the increased ICE presence across the country and in the Kansas City area, school board leaders from at least two Johnson County school districts sent letters to families outlining their policies about immigration enforcement.
Neither letter explicitly states what would happen if ICE agents showed up to a school to detain a student without proper documentation. (No such instances of ICE coming to schools have been reported in Johnson County.)
A letter from the Shawnee Mission school board, dated Feb. 25 and signed by Board of Education President April Boyd-Noronha and Board of Education Vice President Jessica Hembree, said the district is committed to educating “every single student.”
The school board leaders went on to say that board policy forbids any type of law enforcement from questioning a student without the student’s parents’ consent or a judicial warrant.
Leaders on the Olathe Board of Education last month also sent a letter to families.
They wrote:
- The district will not disclose education records without a court order.
- Anyone who visits the school is required to show valid identification.
- If an immigration enforcement agency comes to a school — which the letter says is “unlikely” — office staff will tell the district’s Safety Services department who will go to the school and work directly with the agency “to minimize disruption to the school day.”
Both Olathe and Shawnee Mission school districts have said that student records do not include citizenship status.
According to the ACLU of Kansas, districts are prohibited from “asking students or their parents about their immigration status for the purposes of enrollment and revealing a student’s or their parent’s immigration status without their permission.”
Terreros, the Shawnee Mission East student, said his district’s letter made him feel more reassured.
“If more students saw that, I think they would feel more comfortable,” he said.
