School Committee Members Explain Their Vote

For many in town, it may seem like School Committee members changed their minds on the Pledge of Allegiance issue, but for the main players – members Judson Pierce and Leba Heigham – the first vote on June 22 was the real mistake.

"In hindsight we were out of order. It should have been tabled," said Heigham in a phone interview last week referring to the June 22 vote that put Arlington's School Committee into the national spotlight after they deadlocked on Senior Sean Harrington's request to reinstate the Pledge of Allegiance at Arlington High School.

Though the pledge has been traditionally recited in all of the elementary schools and at the Ottoson Middle School, it stopped being recited daily at the high school years ago, and the decision as to whether it is recited daily has been left up to the individual school administration.

Harrington spent three years gathering more than 700 signatures for his petition to reinstate the pledge in the high school. He presented it at the June 22 meeting and the committee voted 3-3. A tie fails.

The story went national after Fox News ran a report on the issue and soon the School Committee was flooded with phone calls, e-mails and threats.

Of the three school committee members who voted against the motion – Heigham, Judson Pierce and Kirsi Allison-Ampe – two (Pierce and Heigham) elected last Tuesday – as part of the policies and procedures subcommittee of the Arlington School Committee - to send a new draft policy regarding the Pledge of Allegiance out for legal review.

The potential new policy states that American flags shall be appropriately displayed in each classroom in the Arlington Public Schools, that the principal of each Arlington public school will ensure that every student has the opportunity say the Pledge of Allegiance each school day if the student desires, but that a student, administrator or teacher will not be punished for not saying it.

"I viewed the summer, a time when students are not in school, as an opportunity to look to other district's policies and consult with experts," Pierce said in an e-mail last Wednesday. "These last four weeks have been an amazing learning experience. I have had the opportunity to study the law and speak with lawyers, legislators, educators and the public. I am now comfortable voting for a voluntary Pledge of Allegiance."

Though some in town have complained that it seemed like a change of heart, neither Heigham nor Pierce, the chairman of the subcommittee and an attorney by trade, viewed it as such.

"I absolutely believe that we should not have voted on a non-written motion that was amended on the fly in the short space of 10 minutes on June 22," said Pierce.

The new draft policy was set to go to the school's law firm, but Town Counsel Juliana Rice, who has been well acquainted with the issue looked at the draft and deemed it acceptable.

"It has to be completely voluntary, which is what this policy does. It provides the opportunity but it does not punish students for not saying it."

Heigham said once it goes through the school's law firm, then it will be up for discussion, hopefully at the August 3 meeting of the School Committee.

"There are a lot of things going on. I think state law and federal law are slightly at odds," Heigham said. "And I think what we are doing is a bit extraneous. But I need to listen to community members and I have had more people call me privately with concerns about not being compelled to say it then people angry because it was not being recited. For me, this is less about saying the Pledge and more about having a policy that protects individual rights. This creates a place for their civil rights."