Florida school delays yearbook distribution over photos of ‘Don’t Say Gay’ protests

“To have that covered up isn’t right. ... This is censorship,” one of the yearbook’s editors-in-chief said.

by Brooke Migdon | May 10, 2022 | May. 10, 2022

Florida State Representative Smith (HD 49) speaks at a press conference at the Florida state capital, hosted by Equality Florida, AIDS Healthcare Foundation and the Human Rights Campaign in opposition of HB 1577 (Don’t Say Gay bill) on Tuesday, February 15, 2022, in Tallahassee, Fla. (Rick Wilson/AP Images for AIDS Healthcare Foundation)

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A high school in central Florida has said it will not distribute yearbooks until photographs of a student-led demonstration against the state’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law are covered up — an effort by district officials to avoid speculation that the school supported the students’ walkout.

In a statement, Lyman High School Principal Michael Hunter said “pictures and descriptions” of the student walkout in March “did not meet school board policy” and should have been “caught earlier in the review process.”

Images of the yearbook page in question posted online show students holding rainbow LGBTQ+ pride flags. In one photo, a student holds a sign with the words “Love is Love” above her head.

In March, students at Lyman High School joined hundreds of other Florida students in protesting what is officially known as the Parental Rights in Education bill, which Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) signed into law later that month.

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Under the law, which takes effect July 1, primary school teachers in Florida are barred from engaging in classroom instruction related to sexual orientation or gender identity. Public school educators through high school are prohibited from addressing either topic in a manner that is not “age appropriate or developmentally appropriate” for their students, and parents have more leeway to take legal action against school districts believed to be in violation of the law.

Hunter in his statement said the school had decided to cover the yearbook images rather than replace them to save time and money.

“Rather than reprinting the yearbook at substantial cost and delay, we have elected to cover that material that is out of compliance with board policy so that yearbooks can be distributed as soon as possible,” he said.

Speaking to the Orlando Sentinel, Danielle Pomeranz, Lyman High School yearbook’s faculty advisor, said reprinting the 600 yearbooks ordered by students this year would cost around $45,000. She said she had been approached by school officials curious whether placing stickers over photos and written captions of the walkout could be a viable option.

Skye Tiedemann, one of the yearbook’s editors-in-chief, likened the school’s withholding of the yearbooks to “censorship.”

“This really shouldn’t be happening because all we did as journalists was document what was happening at our school on our campus,” she told the Sentinel. “To have that covered up isn’t right. … This is censorship.”

State lawmakers also weighed in on the school’s decision to cover the photos, joining Lyman High School students and others in using the hashtag “#stopthestickers” online.

“This censorship is a direct result of the law these students were protesting,” Rep. Carlos G. Smith (D), Florida’s first openly LGBTQ+ Latino state lawmaker, wrote Tuesday on Twitter. “#WeWillNotBeErased in this so-called “free state”.

In a letter to the Seminole County School Board, Florida Rep. Anna V. Eskamani (D) wrote that she was “disappointed to hear that the advocacy for marginalized communities will be erased from the Lyman High School Yearbook.” Eskamani added that, to her knowledge, images of a 2018 student walkout protesting gun violence were not covered.

“Your decision to censor only LGBTQ+ advocacy sends a message that you consider issues of student equality to be inappropriate and unworthy of recognition,” Eskamani wrote. “This is a dangerous precedent set.”

The school board is set to meet Tuesday evening, according to WKMG-TV, an Orlando television station. Students have planned to peacefully protest.