The Shenandoah County, Va. school board voted in May 2024 to rename Mountain View High School as Stonewall Jackson High School and Honey Run Elementary as Ashby Lee Elementary four years after the names had been removed. Now, a judge has found the decision to rename the high school violated students' free speech rights.
<a href="https://virginiamercury.com/2025/09/10/federal-judge-says-restoring-stonewall-jackson-name-at-shenandoah-school-violates-students-rights/" target="_blank" link-data="{"cms.site.owner":{"_ref":"00000173-0561-d1f0-a17f-adef4bee0000","_type":"ae3387cc-b875-31b7-b82d-63fd8d758c20"},"cms.content.publishDate":1757538383770,"cms.content.publishUser":{"_ref":"00000173-e988-d25a-a7ff-f9cb2a4c0000","_type":"6aa69ae1-35be-30dc-87e9-410da9e1cdcc"},"cms.content.updateDate":1757538383770,"cms.content.updateUser":{"_ref":"00000173-e988-d25a-a7ff-f9cb2a4c0000","_type":"6aa69ae1-35be-30dc-87e9-410da9e1cdcc"},"link":{"disableUtmTracking":false,"target":"NEW","attributes":[],"url":"https://virginiamercury.com/2025/09/10/federal-judge-says-restoring-stonewall-jackson-name-at-shenandoah-school-violates-students-rights/","_id":"00000199-3573-d4d3-a7db-f77343390000","_type":"ff658216-e70f-39d0-b660-bdfe57a5599a"},"linkText":"Courtesy of Nathaniel Cline/Virginia Mercury","theme.brightspot-theme-default.:core:enhancement:Enhancement.hbs.enhancementAlignment":null,"theme.brightspot-theme-default.:core:link:Link.hbs._template":null,"theme.brightspot-theme-default.:core:link:Link.hbs.type":null,"theme.brightspot-theme-default.:core:link:Link.hbs._preset":null,"theme.brightspot-theme-default.:core:enhancement:Enhancement.hbs._preset":null,"_id":"00000199-3573-d4d3-a7db-f77342e50001","_type":"809caec9-30e2-3666-8b71-b32ddbffc288"}">Courtesy of Nathaniel Cline/Virginia Mercury</a>
A teacher at Audrey H. Lawson Middle School in Houston marks a grade on a worksheet on Sept. 6, 2023. Texas lawmakers have passed a bill that would drop the state's once-a-year STAAR test in favor of a model in which students are tested three times a year.
Hundreds of students stand together in prayer during an Ash Wednesday service at Flint Powers Catholic High School on March 5, 2025, in Flint, Mich. President Donald Trump on Monday said the U.S. Department of Education will issue guidance about the right to prayer in schools.
A sign for a newly-constructed gender neutral bathroom is seen at Shawnee Mission East High School on June 16, 2023, in Prairie Village, Kan. The Trump administration's finding that a northern Virginia school district violated Title IX by allowing students to use restrooms consistent with their gender identity is the subject of a new lawsuit.
Penelope Koutoulas holds signs supporting school choice in a House committee meeting on education during a special session of the Tennessee state legislature on Jan. 28, 2025, in Nashville, Tenn. After the passage of the first federal tax-credit scholarship, all states will have to decide whether to opt into the new program.
Parents await news during an active shooter situation at the Annunciation Church in Minneapolis on Aug. 27, 2025. This is the first school shooting of the new academic year.
A newly-constructed gender-neutral bathroom is seen at Shawnee Mission East High School, Friday, June 16, 2023, in Prairie Village, Kan. The Shawnee Mission school district is one of four in Kansas that the Trump administration has started investigating at the urging of the state's Republican attorney general, Kris Kobach.
Laid-off U.S. Department of Education staff are greeted by supporters after retrieving their personal belongings from the Washington offices on March 24, 2025. The department has announced return dates for a portion of laid-off staffers.
A commuter walks past the Washington headquarters of the U.S. Department of Education on March 12, 2025. The department has imposed financial restrictions on five Virginia school districts for policies allowing transgender students to use bathrooms consistent with their gender identity.
A Midland ISD employee walks past the front of Legacy High School on Thursday, Aug. 7, 2025, in Midland, Texas. The district's board voted to restore a Confederate general's name to two of its schools.
The Lyndon Baines Johnson Department of Education Building in Washington is shown on May 5, 2025. A federal judge who ordered the department to restore laid-off staffers to its office for civil rights says the agency hasn't "substantially complied" with his order.
President Donald Trump hands a pen to professional golfer Bryson DeChambeau after Trump signed an executive order restarting the Presidential Fitness Test in public schools as Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and Vice President JD Vance watch on July 31, 2025, in the Roosevelt Room of the White House.
Penelope Koutoulas holds signs supporting school choice in a House committee meeting on education during a special session of the state legislature Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025, in Nashville, Tenn. The One, Big Beautiful Bill Act championed by President Donald Trump includes the first federal school voucher program. States will decide whether to opt in to the offering.
Penny Schwinn appears before the U.S. Senate's Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee in Washington on June 5, 2025, for her confirmation hearing to serve as deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Education. Schwinn plans to withdraw her nomination for that role.
Students put away supplies at the end of a lesson at the Head Start program run by Easterseals on Jan. 29, 2025, in Miami. The Trump administration reclassified Head Start as a "federal public benefit" similar to welfare so it can bar undocumented students from the early childhood program, but the policy is now on hold in 20 states and the District of Columbia.
The U.S. Department of Education has revealed new priorities for two mental health grants after it abruptly canceled awards the Biden administration made.
Students make measurements to wood to add to a tiny home project during their shop class at Carrick High School in Pittsburgh, Pa., on Dec. 13, 2022. The Trump administration is shifting management of career and technical education programs to the U.S. Department of Labor now that the Supreme Court have given the go-ahead to proceed with downsizing of the U.S. Department of Education.