Students lobby Kansas legislators over bill to prosecute teachers (VIDEO)

Students at Wichita East High and other area schools spent their lunch period Friday urging Kansas lawmakers to reconsider a proposal that will make it easier to prosecute teachers for distributing harmful material to minors.

“If this happens, then the entire school system would be shaken,” said Cecilia Schreck, a junior at East.

“I feel like all literature should be able to be read,” she said. “Just because it’s a little bit offensive doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be spoken because real life is not going to be able to be blocked out like that.”

Andrew Figueiredo and Trevor Mahan, students at East, launched an effort via Facebook to oppose Senate Bill 56, which won approval in the Kansas Senate on Wednesday and seems headed for a House committee. The boys urged students to gather during lunch to call or e-mail state legislators and voice their opposition to the bill.

“We’re going to try to reach as many people as we can,” said Figueiredo, a junior, addressing the group. “They’re supposed to be accountable to us. … We’re here to vouch for our rights, to vouch for the rights of our teachers and to make sure our education system is on the right track for the future, not the wrong track.”

Proponents of the measure say it would give needed protection to students. Opponents say it could criminalize the teaching of biology or controversial works of art or literature and would have a chilling effect on teachers and school districts.

Over lunch Friday, several dozen East students gathered in adjacent classrooms and, armed with copies of a script crafted by Figueiredo, dialed lawmakers on their cellphones. Several students at Southeast, North and other area schools said on the Facebook page that they planned to participate as well.

Sophomore Catherine Yang sat in a school desk and dialed legislators’ numbers. Most of her calls went right to voice mail. She introduced herself as an East High student and went into her spiel.

“It’s a very bad idea to turn teachers into criminals,” Yang said on one message. “I hope you will support academic freedom and vote no on SB 56.”

Diane Gjerstad, a lobbyist for the Wichita school district, said a handful of lawmakers complained to her Friday after they were bombarded with phone calls during the students’ 30-minute lunch period. She said she wasn’t aware of the telephone campaign beforehand and that she hoped to talk with the students about strategic lobbying.

“This was completely independent and student-generated,” Gjerstad said. “… They want to be involved in their community and in their future, and that’s a really positive thing.

“But oftentimes with mass advocacy efforts like this, people on the receiving end tune it out because they receive 100 of the same messages,” she said. “This is a great opportunity for students to think about, ‘How are we going to share our message in a way that is positive and gets the point across?’”

Said Figueiredo afterward: “We probably could have and should have been more efficient in targeting, but I still feel it went pretty well for a high-schooler event.”

Mahan, a sophomore, said it was crucial for students to make their voices heard about the bill, which he said “limits education and limits our future.” He added that schools shouldn’t shield students from educational materials that some would find offensive.

“The world can be offensive sometimes. That’s an honest truth we all need to face,” he said. “We can’t hide students from that. It’s part of education because it’s part of the world that we live in.”

Melanie Lower, a junior, said her English class is reading John Green’s “Looking for Alaska,” a young adult novel that has been challenged in some areas because it includes explicit language and scenes of sexual encounters between teenagers.

“There’s a scene in there that teachers could get into trouble for,” Lower said. “But they shouldn’t. … It’s a great book.”

This story was originally published February 27, 2015 at 3:11 PM with the headline "Students lobby Kansas legislators over bill to prosecute teachers (VIDEO)."