Middle school students join national discussion about Trump

San Francisco visual arts instructor Caren Andrews asked her students to add their voices to the nationwide conversation regarding Trump’s first 100 days in office.

Andrews believes the U.S. Constitution is vital in an era where civil rights are up for debate. So – inspired by a 1960s Bill of Rights poster published by the ACLU – Andrews asked her middle school students at San Francisco Friends School to create their own set of political posters. Andrews encouraged her students to respond through visual art to other political issues, such as the gender pay gap, abortion, and LGBTQ rights.

Eighth grader Billie Breskin re-purposed the iconic photograph “Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima” by replacing the stars and stripes in the famous image with the rainbow colors of the pride flag.

“Part of being American is protecting what’s back home,” Breskin says. “I wanted to do something truly patriotic, but present it in a way that includes the LGBT community.”

via KQED
photo: Raising the Flag on America by Billie Breskin. (Courtesy of Caren Andrews)