National polarization chills political discourse as students stifle values, opinions

It’s a familiar scene to most students: a teacher asks the class a question only to be met by blank stares, the same two or three students perhaps raising their hand to offer an answer. Typically, this reluctance to participate can be attributed to not paying attention or fear of judgement for offering the wrong answer. When questions of political philosophy arise in social studies, English, or other classes, the anxiety weighing down students’ hands can be even more intense, lest a comment offend other students. On the other hand, the impetus to weigh in on current events can lighten that weight significantly.

A survey of 207 West students this February shed light on students’ political expression and engagement. A large share of students reported reluctance to share their true political or social views in class discussions: 20.4% of respondents said they never express their true views in this context, compared to 13.4% and 14.1% who always or usually express their views, respectively. The greatest share, 38.9%, reported sharing their true views only sometimes.

Students who self-identified as conservative or conservative-leaning were more likely than liberal or liberal-leaning students to never express their true political/social views in class, with 12.1% of liberals and 20.5% of conservatives never voicing their opinions. Centrist students were even less likely than either of these groups, with 25.8% saying they never express their true views. Similar shares of liberal and conservative students—16.4% and 15.9%, respectively—say they always share these views, compared to 6.5% of centrists.

More than a dozen students across the political spectrum wrote about a fear of being shamed, viewed differently by peers, or attacked if they were to share their political perspectives in class discussions. Though she is confident in her own political views, senior Maggee Hild has sometimes chosen not to express these opinions around peers because of an awareness of others’ sensitivity.

“If I know someone doesn’t have the same opinion as me, I’m not going to present myself to them with what I think is correct,” she said. “It’s mainly just based on how I can respond to their feedback and their body language to the topic, and who I’m speaking to.”

Though a majority of students may often be more comfortable keeping their political perspectives to themselves, the survey revealed a strong inclination towards civic engagement. Eighty-one percent of students said they planned to vote in the next election, or the first they are able to after turning 18. This figure was even higher among seniors, who are closest to voting and guaranteed to have taken at least one semester of government and politics, with 84.6% having plans to vote.

Students showed interest in other forms of political engagement. On a five-point scale, survey respondents rated their awareness of how they “can influence government and get involved in the community” an average 3.6, and they rated their understanding of how local, state, and federal government works an average 3.4.

In addition to keeping up on current events, junior Katie Berry has stood up for policies she believes in, particularly related to immigration and education.

“I’ve done the different scripts for calling your representative. I did the email once, too, getting my voice out there and encouraging others to do the same,” she said. 

Junior Brekken Urban says student political engagement is a critical part of participating in his community.

“I can’t make much of a legal impact, but I can make a social impact. I can go out there and protest. I can state my political views,” he said. “I hear people say, ‘I don’t really care about politics.’ Well, it affects your daily life, and it sounds very privileged of you to say that.”

At the same time, overzealousness about current events can also dampen appetite for political conversation. Berry limits her discussion of political issues to at home because of how quickly these topics can spark drama among peers.

“One of my classes likes to be very vocal about stuff and it disrupts class time,” she said. “If I say I’m trying to work, they get all back at me. I’m not trying to argue. I have my views, but I don’t want to talk about it.”

Pew Research Center has found that a sizable majority of Americans (65%) “always/often” feel exhausted discussing politics. Many students, like junior Chloe Mellgren, tend not to share their political views in class because it seems pointless to contend with others so deeply impassioned about their own views.

“I feel as though it is a difficult topic to bring up when I greatly disagree with the louder voices in the class,” she wrote in the survey. “While I do believe that they are wrong and it upsets me with how ignorant they can be, I don't want to bring emotion into a political argument when they will just shoot that down.”

School may also be an undesirable space for some students to share political views because they feel generally unwelcomed by student culture. Junior Astrid Larson has observed that many students behave prejudicially towards their peers.

“There are a lot of people who are very unaccepting of LGBTQ people,” she said. “There’s definitely a lot of racism at the school, even if it’s just joking. There’s a lot of ableism that I’ve seen.”

For some students, matters of personal identity can be difficult to disentangle from politics in light of mainstream understandings of the nation’s history and diversity, according to senior Micah Troedel, President of Oshkosh West’s Black Student Union.

“One thing I have learned is that any time people of color unite it will be viewed as political regardless of what is actually discussed,” he said. 

A large share of survey respondents said they are not dissuaded from sharing their views by the potential for criticism, and some even feel encouraged to be vocal about their beliefs because they know it will challenge their peers. Sophomore Sophie Fletcher is committed to fostering ideological exploration and free expression.

“I share my beliefs because personally, I don't have problems with confrontation,” she said. “I know why I have the beliefs that I do, and even if I get backlash, that’s not enough to make me feel bad about myself or deeply question my belief systems.”

The classroom, particularly social studies classes, can provide a space for students to participate in respectful political discussion. Hild appreciated such student-led discourse in courses like US Government and Politics. 

“Students actually had full-on discussions in that class because the teacher wasn’t really voicing their opinion on it, which I really appreciated,” she said. “Some people, you can kind of tell what side they take on, or sometimes they’ve shared their beliefs. I think in those classes, it was really nice because they didn’t, and the teacher is very unbiased.”

Other students have had a different classroom experience. While he says teachers are not explicit about their political views and strive to create an open classroom environment, Urban has found subtle actions, like giving more time for students with particular viewpoints to speak in class or using anti-racist curricula, sometimes privilege certain perspectives over others.

“It’s so obvious sometimes the way they swing is based on the way that they teach their class,” he said. “In English we’ll focus on this race and this race and this race, and then not white people, like white people haven’t done anything good, so we’re not going to focus on them.”

Social studies teacher Patrick Bertram values discussion of current events as a way to promote engagement in the classroom and help students apply the topics they are learning to the real world. An important part of this for him is teaching students how to navigate perspectives divergent from their own.

“I try to allow students to speak, and sometimes a student will say something that is unpopular, and I try to remind the rest of the class that we’re here to listen,” he said. “We don’t have to agree with what the other person says, but understanding another person’s viewpoint is important because we all live in this country.”

Despite being caught in the crosshairs of debates over book bannings, social studies curricula, and other issues, trust in the objectivity of K-12 schools is relatively high. In a 2025 study, researchers at the Brookings Institution found that 36 and 12% of American adults believe public schools have a liberal or conservative lean, while only 19 and 14% of high school students studied believe that public schools have a liberal or conservative bias, respectively.

Having conservative views himself, Urban has noticed that conservative students at West are often overlooked by peers and staff, and often find themselves pressured not to share their perspectives for fear of them being considered controversial or discriminatory. 

“I think there is a perception that there are not many conservative students enrolled at West because our main clubs and groups have been taken over by ‘wokeness,’ such as the Black Student Union and Gay Straight Alliance [Gender Sexuality Alliance],” he said. “I feel like it would be good to bring political diversity to the school, especially when those who are Republican or conservative or right-wing feel afraid to speak up because they’re intimidated by left-wing viewpoints in public schools.” 

Hild believes that the US’s divided political culture and many people’s impulse to distance themselves from extreme views could mask the political diversity of West’s students.

“I think people are underjudging how many people do fully side with the right, and how many people are actually in the middle,” she said.

To create a space for conservative students and promote political discourse in general, Urban set out this September to establish a Turning Point USA (TPUSA) chapter at West. Though it is officially independent from any political parties, the organization is widely seen as controversial due to its affiliation with late founder Charlie Kirk and national Republican leaders. While he says dozens of students have reached out to him to express interest in joining TPUSA, Urban says starting a chapter at West has presented obstacles that he believes would not be as prevalent if he were organizing a left-leaning student group.

“We’ve been having issues finding a teacher advisor because a lot of teachers are either not willing to do it or they’re afraid of what their co-workers would say or their students would say or they just don’t swing that way on the political spectrum,” he said. 

Spanish teacher Rick Webster would support loosening restrictions on teachers’ expression to expose students to a variety of ideas beyond familiar perspectives at home and online.

“That should be the core of education, is to give them dissenting opinions and advice, and then they take those things and weigh them,” he said. “It’s not a matter of saying, ‘This is what I believe and I am right.’ It would be more of, ‘This is what I believe, here is why I believe it, and there are other ways to look at it.’”

Webster says that he has seen more pressure on teachers to restrict their political expression in recent years, and credits this to the education system’s efforts to avoid getting caught in controversy amid the country’s more polarized political culture. 

“I’ve been around a long time. I have never seen the division between the two sides this wide,” he said. “People are scared, and they’re angry, and they’re not interested in hearing what the other side has to say.”

Growing political polarization in the US is well-documented, often extending to apolitical culture and perceptions of personal character. Studying the geolocation and addresses of registered voters, researchers at Harvard University found that Democrats and Republicans live in highly segregated bubbles of like-minded individuals, a trend that held up across urban, suburban, and rural communities. The share of both Democrats and Republicans who say members of the other party are close-minded, dishonest, immoral, unintelligent, lazy, and a combination of four or more of these traits, rose sharply from 2016 to 2022, polling from Pew Research Center found.

Many theories have been proposed to explain America’s political polarization, including income inequality, immigration, the country’s unique voting system, and social media. Bertram suggests that the abundance of news media, particularly sources catering to particular audiences, is largely responsible for this trend.

“I think that, for people who are really into it, they kind of retreated more into their camps,” he said. “People have always sought out media or news coverage that speaks to them, that shares their ideas. I think social media just kind of amplifies that because it’s always available.”

At the same time, Bertram also sees the benefits of integrating technology into the political landscape, particularly merged with the personal interaction and refereed environment offered in the classroom.

“I’ve had students look up things that may be more controversial for fact checking,” he said. “Sometimes it’s just the marketplace of ideas in the classroom, where I’ve had students correct other students and engage in more of a dialogue.”

Many students feel that technology is a helpful tool to find new perspectives and stay engaged with the world. In the February survey, social media was the most popular source of news for students, with 82% saying they tend to get their news from social media. This was followed by news websites/apps and TV, where 75.2% and 49%, respectively, tend to get their news.

Urban values the additional depth that can come with online political discussion.

“Online, I can make my points really specific and detailed and use facts and statistics and research to back them up,” he said.

In an interview, one anonymous sophomore said they appreciate the first-hand perspective offered by social media.

“I get my news typically from social media first off, and then I look more into it with articles online,” they said. “When it comes to the news, it gets censored and they have scripts.”

Trust in news media has been falling sharply in the past several years. Gallup reports that, in October 2025, the share of Americans with a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in mass media like newspapers, TV, and radio had fallen to an all-time low of 28%, less than the percentage expressing “none at all.” In a 2025 survey by Pew Research Center, 53% of respondents who believed Republicans and Democrats cannot agree on basic facts said a major reason for this disagreement is partisans getting different information, as opposed to interpreting the same information differently. 

When she evaluates news media, Berry is mindful of the bias that different sources might present.

“I try to do a variety. So, news station-wise, looking at NBC or something, then also looking at Fox and seeing the different views of liberal versus conservative,” she said. “I gather what both sides are saying and then form my own opinion.”

Larson sees danger in unwillingness to consider the perspectives of others and reluctance to share one’s own views.

“Ignorance breeds fear, so when people are ignorant of things that are going on in the world, except for snippets, they become afraid, especially afraid of others or afraid of change,” she said. 

Webster, who recalls long having limited awareness of social issues and their relation to his own identity, has found that seeking new perspectives and challenging one’s social and political paradigm can be difficult, but offers deep rewards for individuals and their communities.

“It’s just too easy to let other people make your decisions for you,” he said. “Having an educated populace is against what the oligarchs want or need, so if you don’t want other people to make bad decisions for you, then you need to be able to make good decisions for yourself.”

by Aria Boehler

Published March 2, 2026

Oshkosh West Index Volume 122 Issue V