Student Comfort Levels during Political Discourse in High School Classrooms

Abstract

Growing political polarization has led to intense debate over political discourse in the high school classroom setting, leading to questions about if students feel comfortable during political discussions. Traditionally, it has been thought that politics should not be in the classroom to avoid indoctrinating students. However, recent research has cast doubt on the reality of indoctrination through classroom political discourse. Additionally, studies have shown that there are benefits to the introduction of politics in the classroom as students grow tolerant towards opposing beliefs. However, research has not explored the comfort levels of students during political discourse, a factor to consider when discussing political discourse in the classroom. To explore this issue, this study used an electronic survey to gather if a student is aware of their teacher's political beliefs, whether they agree with them, and then five questions to receive a score on the Comfortability in Learning (CIL) Scale. Then, a correlation was performed between the CIL Score and the student's knowledge and consensus with their teacher's beliefs. Contrary to popular belief, this study showed that if a student is aware of their teacher's beliefs, there is not a significant difference in comfort levels. However, if they disagree with their teacher's beliefs, then there is a moderate difference in comfort levels. These findings indicate that political discourse in high schools is not a fundamental issue, but rather the way that teachers present political discourse and ostracize dissenting students. This calls for additional training for educators to promote positive political discourse.