ACLU voices concerns over Milford School District policy changes
MILFORD, Del. – The ACLU penned an open letter to the Milford School Board this week, voicing concerns that proposed changes to the district’s policies on instruction of controversial issues could violate the first amendment rights of students and educators.
Mike Brickner, Executive Director of the ACLU of Delaware, said that the language in the proposed changes to Milford School Board’s Controversial Issues policy is overly broad, leaving questions as to what a ‘controversial issue’ is in the first place.
“We know that a policy that’s vague, that could be implemented or enforced differently across different ideas or for different people could violate people’s First Amendment rights.”
Brickner said that a subtle but key change is that with the current policy, teachers should allow the expression of multiple viewpoints, but with the proposed policy, teachers are required to teach multiple viewpoints. According to Brickner, this could lead to problems when almost anything could be argued as a controversial subject: “So the history teacher’s teaching about the Holocaust, are they then required to teach the theory of Holocaust denialism?”
Brickner said that to his knowledge, the policy that has been in place for decades was not causing any issues. “What we are advising them to do is to reject and table this policy altogether,” he said.
“What we all want is for young people to learn in a safe environment and to be able to engage in those sometimes difficult conversations. Unfortunately, I think this policy does the very opposite of that.”
Brickner added that he thinks if the new policies are adopted, they could leave the school district open to litigation in the future.
The potential changes would alter policy that has gone untouched since 1982. The Board could vote on these proposed changes at a meeting on June 17th.
The Milford School Board has not publicly responded to the ACLU’s concerns, and did not respond to WMDT’s request for comment.
