So, students in a government-funded public school agree to participate in a protest their teachers told them about in order to get out of class.
Imagine if this were a Trump/MAGA rally, and the students were instead military members who were legally given time off by their supervisors to attend.
Time away from classes sounds more like a carrot/reward to convince students to at least pretend they agree with the protest organizers.
I wonder what the permission slips looked like and how many parents wanted to refuse to sign but didn't want to paint a target on their kids' backs?
If a student group on campus decided to hold a protest against a new firearm law restricting gun rights, would have the same level of reaction?
We may not agree with the cause but this is still a lesson in civics, so it isn't antithetical to school. Learning what protests/rallies look like, learning what someone can and cannot do at a protest, etc.
Maybe the best idea would have been to let students pick between sides and you could have two groups holding signs, 1 in support for ICE, the other criticizing ICE.
I remember doing a current events session in high school. I had selected an article about some gun law at the time and following the article was a somewhat contentious discussion about the topic with my pro-gun rights stance being in the minority among the students.
I would have a problem if students were forced to protest or forced to pick a certain side.