A Freedom High clash shows the line schools walk between the rules and letting students celebrate their heritage.
By RODNEY THRASH and MELANIE AVE
Published October 8, 2004
[Times photo: Mike Pease]
Seated with some of the flags taken from Hispanic students on Wednesday, Freedom High School principal Richard Bartels address the media Thursday. "I don't think it's a First Amendment issue,'' Bartels said. "I think we established a policy that we believed would ensure the) safety and welfare of all of our kids."
[Times photo: Mike Pease]
Freedom High principal Richard Bartels revoked the suspensions of five Hispanic students who displayed flags. "Flags have not become an issue here until the last two or three days,'' Bartels said.
TAMPA - All any of them wanted to do was show pride for their Hispanic heritage.
Juan Balcazar, Sandra Cardenas, Steffanie Lozano and Gretchen Rexach wore yellow, blue and red Colombian flags. Ryan Novitch wore a red, white and blue Puerto Rican bandera.
None of them imagined it would escalate to three- and five-day suspensions, allegations of racism and simmering tensions between white and Hispanic students at Freedom High School.
"We're not doing this to cause fights or anything," said Cardenas, a 13-year-old freshman who was one of six students suspended from Freedom High School. "We just want to represent our country."
Throughout the bay area and across the nation, school administrators frequently address the issue of flags.
In Pasco County last year, four white students strung a Confederate flag over Hudson High School as a late-night prank. The incident spurred arguments, four suspensions and two arrests before the school banned the symbol from the campus.
At Tarpon Springs High School in Pinellas County, Krista Abram was suspended for circulating a petition to ban the Confederate flag. Her suspension was reduced from 10 days to three, and the Pinellas County School Board toughened its dress code, instructing principals to keep student clothing from disrupting learning.
In each district, policies differ. And they sometimes are at odds with the policies of individual schools.
Before the Abram case, Pinellas left such decisions to the discretion of principals.
Pasco does not have a specific rule banning flags , said assistant superintendent Bob Dorn, but the district reserves the right to exclude clothing and other items that disrupt order or learning.
"A disruption is kids breaking out into fights, arguments stopping teachers from teaching," Dorn said.
"It's more than, "Gee, I don't like that particular flag."'
* * *
Principal Richard Bartels of Freedom High said he hoped this day would never come. He wrote a rule to quell situations like this.
When the boundaries were drawn for a new high school in Tampa Palms three years ago, Bartels knew he had a hefty task ahead of him. He was to bring students from three distinctive communities - New Tampa, the University of South Florida area and Lutz - under one roof. Many of them didn't want to be there.
Parents were concerned about the potential for tensions. And so was Bartels.
"I saw flags as a potential problem," he said. "We made a decision at that point and time that flags would not be permitted on this campus, and we have legal opinions to that effect to support my decision."
Not so fast, some in the legal community say.
Tampa First Amendment lawyer Luke Lirot said the display of flags is a manifestation of a person's free speech rights.
"There are many, many cases that talk about it," he said. "You don't leave your constitutional rights at the schoolhouse door."
Earlier cases often sided with students, including a 1969 Supreme Court decision that upheld their right to wear black armbands to protest the Vietnam War. More recent court cases have not been so generous, Lirot said.
"They look a lot toward a school's obligation to maintain order," Lirot said. "If it's gang-related, they can somehow justify it.
"My opinion is, they shouldn't be able to restrict any of this. This just leaves a bad taste in my mouth."
Bartels said he doesn't see it that way.
"I don't think it's a First Amendment issue," he said. "I think we established a policy that we believed would ensure (the) safety and welfare of all of our kids.
"As the principal of the school, it's ultimately my responsibility. I accept total responsibility for what goes on on this campus."
Freedom High doesn't have an all-out ban against flags, he said. "Certainly the appropriate settings for flag display are classrooms, foreign language classrooms, social studies classrooms," he said.
Nothing in the student handbook alludes to flags. Nor does the county have a systemwide policy against them.
"You're not going to spell out a policy for every conceivable contingency," Bartels said.
Students knew better than to display flags, he said.
"Flags have not become an issue here until the last two or three days," Bartels said.
His remarks came at a news conference. Behind him was a large portrait of the American flag.
* * *
On Thursday, four suspended students and their families met with Bartels for more than an hour.
Cardenas and Lozano told him they felt unfairly singled out, because they were speaking in Spanish after they got in trouble for wearing flags. The most recent statistical breakdown of Freedom's student population from the district says that out of 1,500 students, about 18 percent are Hispanic, about half are white and a quarter are black.
Lozano said she also wanted Bartels to know that "we're very proud of our country and we show it through what we wear." It was enough to convince Bartels to overturn the suspensions of Cardenas, Lozano, Rexach, Novitch and a fifth student who did not attend the Thursday meeting. Balcazar's three-day suspension ended Tuesday. It will remain on his record. He twice refused orders to surrender his flag.
"If he'd handed the flag to the assistant principal, he would have gone back to class," Bartels said.
At 9:55 a.m., Cardenas, Lozano, Novitch and Rexach walked under the red-tiled awning of Freedom High School, book bags in tow.
To meet the principal, Lozano wore a yellow, blue and red Colombian headband, necklace and bracelet.
"I had to represent, anyways," she said.
Times staff writer Monique Fields contributed to this report.
