As students ran home for summer break, they excitedly prepared for three months of relaxation before heading back to school for the next year. Tests and worries safely in the rearview mirror, students could finally decompress. School was the least of students’ worries. However, just a stone’s throw away, at the Capitol building, school was all the Texas state legislature thought about. After weeks of hard deliberation, lawmakers passed Senate Bill (S.B.) 12 and House Bill (H.B.) 1481. The former eliminated Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs in school, while the latter prohibited the use of personal technology during the school day. With students’ voices squarely out of focus in any of the discussions, the legislature effectively shut out any chance for students to protest or advocate for their point of view. 

Almost immediately after the laws were passed, students backlashed at the loss of their ability to use their phones for personal reasons, as well as the harmful effects of anti-DEI policies. In fact, the Horizon published an article at the start of the year featuring students condemning the bills for their heightened overreach into their lives. As the school year went on, dissatisfaction amongst the student body grew. 

“My reaction was one of outrage,” Brijnandan Saranu ‘27 said. “[The laws] seem really bad for everyone involved. [Phones] can be used for educational purposes in school. There’s no reason that phones should be banned for a whole day.”

Two months with the new laws in place, students began to experience their learning environment being stifled actively, and the Horizon published another article, this time about how the incoming laws blurred the line between church and state. Although no action had been taken yet, the overwhelming ideological and verbal resistance instilled a sense of hope in some. Many believed that if students were this discontent, perhaps they would be motivated to change the systems they were upset about. Three months later, however, the situation is the exact same, with the strongest form of resistance being students pulling out their phones to play games during lesson time.

The sustainment of the laws illustrates a key issue. The reason why students are stuck in this position is due to a lack of action on their own part. It’s obviously asinine to hope for change without doing anything. However, change is hard. The vast majority of high-school students don’t have the right to vote, and almost none are eligible to work as lawmakers. Furthermore, the majority of current lawmakers remember the schooling system from a totally different climate, one without any of the new technological or societal transformations that have come to define modern education.  Students have very little power over the laws that affect them, creating an environment of melancholy and resentment, where students want to create change, but can’t. The solution to this problem is obvious, but difficult: more students need to be activists.

“Right now, it doesn’t seem too much change is actually happening [in the government],” Crann Bisson-Donahue ‘27 said. “There are a lot of old ideals that are still being upheld, and I think it is definitely on students to some extent to try to force a change. Students should be active in trying to do that if they want a change instead of just complaining about it. They should actually seek out ways to actively participate and find ways to change the laws they don’t like.”

In a climate where few students have direct power over the laws that so deeply impact them, activism serves as a crucial measure to counterbalance government policies. Students can’t make laws themselves, but they can lobby the people who make the laws. Organizations such as the High School Democrats of America or Texas Rising, which aim to advocate for social justice at the student level, are not only examples of what students should replicate when advocating for change themselves, but also easy mediums to get involved in local, impact-driven activism. 

However, students do not need to join these organizations to enact changes in their community. There are countless other ways to organize. Using social media to spread your message, knocking on doors, speaking out about it at school, and talking to community leaders are just some examples of easy ways for students to ensure their voices are heard. 

“It is important for [students] to be active and to show their voice because even if you can’t physically change the system,” Gabriel Lacey ‘26 said. “You always want your voice heard, and your [opinions] can maybe affect [policy] or sway the minds of those who can [change policy]. [For] example, [students themselves] can’t vote for the school board, but they can talk to the people there and sway their minds on what they think.”

Activism isn’t a rigid idea — it can be whatever the activist wants it to be. If one is not capable of making sweeping changes, they can start small in their household, neighborhood, and school, before working their way up to a larger stage. The sole requisite is simply speaking out in some form. Even if some of the changes students work for are initially low-impact, they’re necessary measures to get activists a foot in the door. Small-scale activism can be ineffective at first, but we cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good. If we do, we raise the barrier to entry for activism, diminishing the voices of students.

Grassroots change from students has been a powerful catalyst for change in the past. The end of the Vietnam War could not have been possible if it was not for the grassroots efforts of students protesting and organizing day and night to fight for what they believed in. The recent phone and DEI policies are the exact same. These policies are an affront to students’ freedoms, but ultimately will not change absent action. The state legislature’s stance is entrenched, and the only hope of a fight back is from students themselves. 

The problem isn’t just that these issues harm students, but also the precedent they set in the years to come. If the government receives no pushback now, it’ll take the tranquility as a blank check to continue running roughshod over students’ individual liberties. The result is a legislature more illiberal than ever, an educational system in ruins, and students disillusioned.