Last week, a vice principal at a California high school disciplined several students for wearing American flag t-shirts to school. Yes, you read that right. The reason that this symbol of our great nation was transformed into a reason for detention? The students wearing them intended the flags to express a point of view – they wore them on the day of the school’s celebration of Cinco de Mayo, honoring many students’ Mexican heritage.

On February 9, 2010 the ACLU of Nevada sent a letter applauding Churchill County High School for publishing a student article about a teacher in the school’s newspaper, despite attempts to block the article by the county’s Education Association.

In a letter addressed to representatives of the Clark County School District, the ACLU of Nevada's Maggie McLetchie requested that Clark County School District reconsider its policy preventing students in the Academy for Individualized Study (AIS) to take part in student athletic programs.

Nevada District Court Judge David Wall denied today a request filed by a group of local parents that sought to stop productions of The Laramie Project and Rent: School Edition at Green Valley High School in Henderson, Nevada. ACLU of Nevada attorneys, who argued that the parents should not be allowed to stop the plays, applauded the decision as a victory for free speech.

The ACLU of Nevada expresses its strong opposition to recent legal action that seeks to prohibit performances of Rent: School Edition and The Laramie Project at Green Valley High School in Henderson. 

The proposed “Policy on Bias Incidents/Hate Crimes” put forward by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas would limit severely restrict free speech and academic freedom on campus.

The ACLU of Nevada together with O’Melveny & Myers LLP are pleased to announce on behalf of its clients Jana Elhifny and Stephanie Hart that we have settled two related long-running federal civil rights lawsuits against the Washoe County School District filed in Reno's Federal District Court in 2004.

Students Have Rights!

Members of the Churchill County community concerned the ACLU of Nevada with an administrative regulation which would allow drug dogs to sniff the belongings of high school students. These searches would be totally suspicionless and random in a school district that purports to have no serious drug problem.

In October 2007, the Esmerelda County School Board approved a policy that prohibits speaking Spanish while riding the school bus. The ACLU received complaints from parents whose children were affected by this policy, and sent a letter to the School District Superintendent Robert Aumaugher asking him to immediately rescind the policy. Mr. Aumaugher agreed to make it clear that students are allowed to speak Spanish while they ride the school bus and sent a letter to parents - in both Spanish and English - explaining the district’s language policy.