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What Good are Rights if You Don’t Know You Have Them? (11/2/2006)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: media@aclu.org
Maine Student Conference to Address Free Speech, Sex Ed and
Equality
ORONO, ME -- Do students shed their rights at the school
house door? Maybe some of them. High school students from northern
Maine will have chance to talk about what they can and can’t say or do, how much
privacy they can expect, and what they can do to get involved and make change in
their school, town or state when they gather for “Life, Liberty, &…,” a
civil liberties conference for young people hosted by the Maine Civil Liberties
Union. The event takes place Friday, November 3 from 9:00 a.m. to 2:15
p.m. at the University of Maine at Orono Memorial Union Bangor
Room.
“Constitutional rights do not start at age 18,” said Rachel
Myers, field organizer for the MCLU. “Students need to know what rights
they can legitimately claim and how to stand up for themselves when those rights
are being violated.”
“Life, Liberty &…” is a follow-up to the
MCLU’s southern Maine conference held in Portland last spring. This time,
students from Bangor, Orono, Old Town and the surrounding towns will attend
workshops on First Amendment rights, comprehensive sex education versus teaching
abstinence only and the rights of lesbian and gay students.
State Senator Elizabeth Schneider (D-Penobscot County) will address the entire
group on civic engagement.
“In our state, there are groups like
Heritage of Maine trying to bring abstinence-only education into the classroom,
students are suspended for exercising their right to political speech, and young
people are still turned away from the prom, and even the military, because of
their sexual orientation,” said Myers. “We want to talk with young people
about what they perceive their rights to be, and what their rights under the
Constitution actually are. The best people to work for students’ rights
are students.”
Tom Sturtevant of Maine Veterans for Peace will
present “No Child Left Unrecruited,” a discussion of military recruitment in the
schools. Under the No Child Left Behind Act, high schools are required to
turn over the personal contact information of juniors and seniors to military
recruiters or face losing federal funding. Students have the right to opt
out of having their personal information shared, but are often unaware of that
right.
“Whether a student is interested in joining the
military or not, everyone deserves the chance to say ‘I do not want my school
sharing my contact information with recruiters who are going to call me at my
home,’” said Sturtevant. “All students need to know that they have a right
to keep their personal information private.”
The event will start
at 9:15 with a round of “Civil Liberties Bingo,” followed by break-out workshop
sessions. The afternoon will include Senator Schneider’s address at 1:00,
entertainment by the UMO Hip Hop Dance Club at 1:15 and Sturtevant’s
presentation and question and answer period at 1:30.
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