Over 100 Berkeley High School (BHS) students marched to Martin Luther King Jr. Civic Center Park on the morning of Tuesday, Jan. 27, to protest these restrictions preventing teachers, citing both district policy and new state legislation as barriers to learning about the topic.
According to a survey conducted by members of BHS student club Jackets for Palestine, 93% of 163 students surveyed said they wanted to learn more about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in school, but believe that fear among educators has kept the topic out of most classrooms. The survey was conducted via google forms and primarily publicized through the Jackets for Palestine instagram account and across some members personal accounts.
The "teach-out" — a combination of a teach-in and walkout — organized by Jackets for Palestine, featured 10 speakers who addressed the crowd from atop the fountain. Participants listened as BHS students, alumni, a Willard Middle School student, community members, and an attorney spoke between 10:43 a.m. and 11:41 a.m. — the duration of 3rd period.
During the demonstration, students criticized both Berkeley Unified School District's (BUSD) Board Policy 6144, which governs the teaching of controversial topics, and AB715, a new state law that went into effect on Jan. 1, which bolsters tools to report discriminatory content and requires the material taught to be factually accurate.
Between speeches, organizers led the engaged crowd in chants including "free, free Palestine" and "from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free." The phrase ‘from the river to the sea’ is a call referring to the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, which includes Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip. Supporters use the chant as a call for freedom and equality for Palestinians, while those with opposing viewpoints sometimes interpret it as implying the removal of the state of Israel.
BUSD's Board Policy 6144 requires teachers to present all sides of controversial issues with appropriate factual information, ensure discussions are related to coursework and are age-appropriate, and they must refrain from persuading students using their personal opinions. The policy does not prohibit educators from discussing any specific topics. However, students at the teach-out expressed concern that the policy's requirements effectively discourage teachers from addressing Palestine at all in the classroom.
Earlier this year, Jackets for Palestine reached out to collaborate with the Ethnic Studies program to present a one-day lesson on the History of Palestine. According to Sonali Mascarenhas-Swan, a senior and president of Jackets for Palestine, some of the teachers were on-board with the presentation, but many felt the need to further consult with the district, for fear of facing backlash or criticism. Mascarenhas-Swan claimed that the Ethnic Studies teachers had made an effort to incorporate Palestinian history into their curriculum years back, but had received opposition from the district.
Liz Jackson, an attorney with Palestine Legal and board member of Jewish Voice for Peace, spoke at the protest about student and teacher rights under the controversial issues policy. She criticized the policy’s requirement for a balanced presentation, arguing it applies inappropriate framing on issues of oppression. “We don’t teach pro-genocide and anti-genocide and balance them,” Jackson said.
Jasmina Viteskic, BUSD's compliance officer and Title IX coordinator, said the policy aims to handle controversial issues "in a very careful and thought-out way" that "doesn't put anyone on the spot."
AB715, backed by the California Legislative Jewish Caucus, went into effect Jan. 1, 2026, to address antisemitism in K-12 schools. The law adds tools to report discriminatory content and requires materials to be "factually accurate," but does not prohibit instruction about Palestinian history or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
David Campbell, a member of Jewish Voice for Peace and Beyt Tikkun Synagogue, deemed the legislation “an abomination… I think it’s fantastic to see high school students coming out and doing this,” Campbell said. “It means I can have hope for the next generation.”
Mascarenhas-Swan pointed out a previous experience of when one of her teachers faced a serious consequence for addressing Palestine in the classroom. “One of my elementary school teachers hung up Palestinian flags in the classroom, and was used in the AB715 bill, and her story was completely twisted,” she said. The teacher, after hanging up the flag, claimed to have been targeted through phone calls, some with threats, and ultimately felt unsafe.
Both AB715 and a letter from a House Committee on a congressional investigation into antisemitism in BUSD reported the teacher as having instructed her students to “write ‘messages of anti-hate’ for display,” and that “the teacher allegedly placed them outside of the classroom of the school's sole Jewish teacher.” In a statement to the Jacket, the teacher wrote and provided photo evidence that the messages were in front of the school’s front office. The teacher has asked to stay anonymous. Additionally, the school in question has multiple Jewish teachers.
“We are calling for our administrators that preach that they are here to protect our rights of freedom of speech to actually be here to protect them,” Mascarenhas-Swan continued.
Alani Soto-Vigil-Koon, a sophomore and Jackets for Palestine member, highlighted the consequences of avoiding teaching about Palestine. The lack of education on the topic “creates ignorance, it creates hate, and it creates disinformation,” Soto-Vigil-Koon said.
Mascarenhas-Swan believes that abolishing the controversial topics policy would be "a very beginning step," but emphasized students also need space to discuss what's happening in real time. "There's this conflict that is happening, I'm watching genocide, I'm watching babies be murdered, and I go to school and nobody's talking about it," she said.
The walkout was about what organizers call the "imperial boomerang" — the idea that silencing in schools enables broader oppression. "What we allow to happen across the world … it's all related, it's interconnected," she said. "When we allow our own teachers to be silenced, what kind of example is that setting?"
Principal Juan Raygoza and Viteskic, among other BUSD employees and staff, observed the walkout from the sidelines. Raygoza said he reached out to student organizers ahead of time to understand their goals and how the administration could support them.
"My number one job is to keep students safe, and that's safe, physically, emotionally, mentally, academically," Raygoza said. "I always want to hear from students...when students come to Berkeley High and have a passion, I want them to know that they can come to me and say, this is something that we want, this is something that we want to know about."
The day before the walkout, the district held an all-day professional development session for social studies teachers on teaching controversial topics — the second part of a training series that began in November 2025. Raygoza acknowledged the importance of communicating these efforts to students. "If we're doing all this work and we're not sharing that it's happening, then maybe the student body doesn't believe that it's happening," he said.
Viteskic explained that the professional development partnership with UC Berkeley teaches "deliberative discourse." The training "teaches teachers on how to engage in controversial issues in a very careful and thought-out way, so that it doesn't put anyone on the spot, and it handles charged things in a very gentle way," Viteskic said. Viteskic emphasized that the district supports student free speech.
The walkout occurred on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which Mascarenhas-Swan said was unintentional. "We found out about that the day-of from a friend who was Jewish and is part of the club," she said. "At first I was like, 'Oh no, there's going to be people who are going to get the completely wrong idea.' But then I saw it as an opportunity - here we are speaking out against the occupation and genocide in Palestine and the censorship of our teachers and by doing so we are honoring the legacy of those impacted by the holocaust. We are saying that never again means never again for anyone.”
Emma Knisbacher, a 2025 BHS alumna and Jackets for Palestine co-founder who spoke at the event, addressed the timing directly. "My ancestors were killed in the Holocaust, so I'm speaking here today to honor their memory," Knisbacher said. "Because there's another Holocaust happening right now in Gaza."
Oskar Cross, a BHS sophomore attending his first school walkout, said he was surprised by the turnout. "I heard in the past it was more like 60 people, and when I was there (it) definitely seemed like more than that," Cross said, "So that was really inspiring to see." Cross said he learned valuable information from the teach-out, including about Board Policy 6144, which some students refer to as the “controversial topics list,” regulations on content teachers are allowed to teach, and student rights to free speech and equal education.
After the demonstration ended at 11:41 a.m., around 25 students remained at the park during their lunch period for activity tables. Students screen-printed "Teach Palestine" onto T-shirts and banners using supplies set up after the speeches. Others wrote responses on red, green, and white sticky notes taped to a large black board, asking students what they wanted to learn and why.
Students' sticky note responses requested learning about topics including "the history of the land and how these issues came to be," "genocide, so it can be prevented," "the UN's neglect of Sudan as their people face the world's worst humanitarian crisis," "people's stories and how they tie into the history and current events," and "everything, so we don't repeat it."
"I hope that we did enough, making an impact on administration and what they think about the controversial topics list and all the things we're talking about," Cross said. "I hope that they're really considering that and supporting teaching Palestine in school."