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How Parents Can Navigate the Election – for the Children’s Sake

How Parents Can Navigate the Election – for the Children’s Sake

By: Dr. Olaf Jorgenson, ACDS Head of School

The day after the election in 2016, as we witnessed a mix of rallies across the nation, teachers in schools across the country found themselves supporting our students’ emotions. I remember writing in a message to the faculty and staff who work with me at Almaden Country Day School that despite the challenges, the contentious election gave us an opportunity as a society to witness how our political institutions worked. Having lived in other parts of the world, I also noted how easy it is to take America’s peaceful transfers of power for granted.

However, recalling the violence following the 2020 election reminds all of us who work in schools about the need to anticipate our upcoming election with thoughtful deliberation, and to be prepared for what may soon come. While our school is committed to remaining politically impartial, our position here is that violence has no place in a democracy or the American election process.

The idealistic teacher in me casts America’s crisis of division as a teachable moment. Not since the anti-war movement of the 1960s have we had such an opportunity to acknowledge and rise above our differences, to promote and advocate only nonviolent activism, to show the children of our country how to disagree respectfully, to recognize that in our diversity of thought lies our greatest potential to prosper if we choose to work together and reunite our nation. For our future’s sake, teachers and parents need to have these conversations with young people in school communities everywhere

Children who live in the Silicon Valley contend with constant pressures to achieve and compete, along with torrents of other adult-sized pressures and anxieties that erode childhood. This election season has only heightened their vulnerability to a host of pundits looking for targets for their anger and agendas; yet schools must remain a safe haven for children regardless of their family’s structure, political leanings, religious affiliations, ethnic backgrounds, or abilities. 

Regardless of our political leanings and passions, if adults can agree that every child is important and worthy of dignity, then we see children as living manifestations of our hope for the future. This then compels us to teach children – and model for them – how to listen to varied perspectives, embodying in our actions integrity, citizenship, and an appreciation for diversity. 

These are neither polarizing nor partisan aims; we can do this. At my school, we’ve done it for 42 years! It is possible in schools everywhere in this state, depending on the willingness of adults to put what’s best for children ahead of their own politics. 

And the children are watching us. Consider the messages we convey with our political side comments and conversations at home – as our children listen – about respect, about power and vulnerability, about what America stands for (and against), about role models and leadership. About trust. About hope. 

Consequently, if together we all keep the children at the center of our response to the 2024 presidential election, we can maintain our school communities as refuges, safe for students, staff, and families, even during this divisive election and its aftermath. I recently wrote a letter to my school’s parent community, asking that they join our faculty in making this commitment, helping us prepare to shelter and support the children through November 5 and beyond.

In the previous two election cycles, parents have asked for concrete strategies to help empower and protect their children from the angry rhetoric and hateful messages engendered by the fallout from the elections, which sometimes found its way onto campus. Here is some guidance for parents as we enter the final weeks of the election season. 

What Parents Can Do

  1. Help children understand that people of goodwill can disagree and still love their country. 
  2. Remember your place as a role model, and focus political conversations away from the personal insults and mockery of public figures in the media that children then repeat at school.
  3. Keep the political messages at home. Advise your children not to attend school with clothing or accessories featuring political speech.
  4. Get involved locally to advocate for change in your community, and empower your children to do the same.
  5. Remember that children are learning from you how the world works, and that your actions and words constantly transmit messages – about how people express disagreement and disappointment, how we regard authority, and what their own future holds – that impact their behavior, beliefs, and feelings of security and confidence at home and at school. 

Now more than ever, the school/parent partnership is vital – cooperation, collaboration, and agreeing to set aside politics for the good of the children – to optimize this election season’s educational value for children while minimizing its impact on their wellness.