Surely you don't need me to tell you that this story was first reported over the weekend in Chicago Indymedia by Rita Sand, whose daughter participated in the sit-in at Berwyn's Morton West high School.

Two other mothers, Pam Winstead and Alma Moran, have backed Sand's account and provided additional details. "I'm very proud of them," said Winstead, whose son is a 16-year-old junior. "He has the freedom to think. The war has been going on for what, five years? These kids have been growing up with it, and they want it to end."

Both mothers said their sons told them the presence of recruiters at the school was a factor in their decision to protest. Recruiters hang around the lunchroom two or three days a week, offering students prizes for doing push-ups, according to Winstead's son.

"The recruiters try to be all friendly, but the kids know what they really want," Moran said. "They're sick of seeing these people."

Both mothers said they weren't informed about the protest beforehand, and they questioned why the school didn't contact parents earlier. The students had their IDs taken at 10:30 a.m., but Winstead said she didn't get a phone call until 2 p.m. "I was at work," she said. "I work downtown. I couldn't get there fast enough."

Moran said she also didn't get a call until hours after the protest began, and other parents told her similar stories but some were contacted quickly.

Winstead and Moran also alleged that once school officials decided on expulsion, they tried to talk certain students into abandoning the protest. "They picked the ones with high grades," said Moran, adding that her son "doesn't have bad grades but doesn't have a 4.0 either." She didn't offer a reason, but under the No Child Left Behind program school funding is tied to students' test scores. "There was a football player in the group," Moran said. "They talked to him too. The other kids were disposable."

The parents also questioned whether a police presence was necessary, and they saw a connection to an Oct. 24 incident that caused Morton West administrators to face criticism for failing to put the school under lockdown when a special education student reported seeing a fellow student with a handgun. "They're totally overreacting because of that incident," Moran said.

Moran added that Nowakowski asked police to arrest the protesters but the officers at the scene refused. Winstead said Nowakowski has threatened to have students older than 17 charged with disorderly conduct. Berwyn Police Chief William R. Kushner wasn't available for comment this afternoon; Nowakowski's office hasn't returned a call for comment.

"We've been frantically reaching out to anyone who can help us," Winstead said. The parents got in touch with the Students for a Democratic Society chapter at Columbia College, which quickly started an online petition. Winstead said someone also contacted the ACLU.

Ed Yonka, a spokesman for the ACLU of Illinois, wouldn't confirm whether the case has been referred to his office. "We still believe that the controlling case in this area is the Tinker vs. DeMoines decision," he said. "I particularly like Justice Fortas' famous quote: 'It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate."

In that 1969 decision, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of two high schoolers who wore armbands to protest the Vietnam War, affirming that the First Amendment applies to public schools. In the ensuing years, other decisions have placed limitations on student's free speech rights, including the recent "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" case.

Winstead said she and other parents have no desire to litigate against the school. "We just want our kids not to be treated like criminals for a non-violent protest. Suspension, fine. Expulsion, no. I can't accept him being deprived of an education."

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