School Officials Try to Discourage Another Walkout

By Antonio Planas

By ANTONIO PLANAS

REVIEW-JOURNAL

Clark County school officials are urging students to avoid missing any more classes for protests of proposed changes in U.S. immigration laws.

Superintendent Walt Rulffes said district officials have heard rumors of plans for district students to walk out of classes today to participate in protests.

“We don’t want to discount the influence of national issues and student interest,” Rulffes said. “But we do want students in school during school hours.”

On Tuesday, about 1,000 students from at least six Las Vegas Valley high schools skipped class to take to the streets in a show of opposition to proposed federal legislation that would make illegal immigrants guilty of a felony for being in the United States.

About 100 more students from four area middle schools mimicked their high school peers and protested around their campuses Wednesday.

Students who skipped class Tuesday and Wednesday to protest were given unexcused absences, and Rulffes said the district will continue to levy the same punishment to any students who choose to participate in a protest during class hours.

To reinforce Rulffes’ message, district officials invited Hispanic youth leaders to join them at a news conference Thursday at the Greer Education Center.

Canyon Springs High School junior Juana Amaya was one of them. Amaya did not partake in Tuesday’s protest, but about 150 other students from her school did.

She said she thinks the message to stay in class today has gotten through to her classmates.

Amaya said that she and her principal, Ronan Matthew, will be discouraging students from leaving classes today and might stand outside the school to try to ensure students do not leave campus.

“You can’t always know what students are going to do, but we’re going to do our best to make sure there isn’t a walkout,” Amaya said.

The hope is that any protesting by students will be postponed to Saturday. Amaya said she will participate in a protest starting at 9 a.m. Saturday. Students will walk from Rancho High School to Las Vegas City Hall, she said.

Chaparral High School senior Benjamin Rodriguez, one of the participants in Tuesday’s protest and a spokesman for a group of students from several area schools that is concerned about immigration overhaul, was not at Thursday’s news conference but said he, too, is discouraging his fellow students from protesting today.

He said he wanted to see them turn out in large numbers this weekend. A weekend protest will separate those who truly believe in the cause from those students who just want to skip class, he said.