Throughout my career as a classroom teacher and a teacher educator, I have repeatedly heard different variations of the phrase, teachers should maintain neutrality in their teaching. Despite the pointed and thorough critiques of neutrality made by countless scholars, “the general public maintains a belief that teachers should be politically neutral” (Journell, 2022).
On the surface, this position may seem reasonable. It is a sentiment that has an air of common sense, one that gains power through repetition. However, it is not a view that withstands deeper questioning. For example: What do you mean by neutral? Can you describe a neutral classroom? Is the provincial curriculum neutral? Are school policies neutral? Are there not some topics that require teachers to take an ethical stand?
Statements about teacher neutrality are loaded with expectation, but filled with misunderstandings about curriculum, teaching, and learning.
The Imposition of Neutrality
While many people assert the need for teacher neutrality, the term itself is often left undefined. In turn, there is no shared understanding of what it means to “maintain neutrality.” Yet, neutrality is riddled with varied connotations; it can infer a lack of opinion, a middle position, disengagement, or a disarming of power (Heybach, 2014). Regardless of one’s interpretation, neutrality itself is imbued with values.
Impossibility
All education is political; teaching is never a neutral act.
-Freire, 1968
It is unreasonable and unrealistic to think that teachers can abandon their identities as they enter the classroom (Journell, 2022). Teachers’ lived experiences, core values, and underlying beliefs about knowledge all impact their classroom practices in myriad ways. Beyond intentional pedagogical choices surrounding curriculum and assessment, teachers’ mundane daily choices reveal and communicate their values. For instance, teachers’ clothing, accessories, classroom decorations, transportation methods, lunch choices, and technology selections all convey values to students.
Even if a teacher did their best to “void their classroom of politics,” the curriculum itself is a political document. Values are woven throughout the curriculum (Hodson, 2009). Curriculum developers make choices about the events, stories, and people that are included. Subsequently, teachers make pedagogical choices that impact how this curriculum is understood. For example, curriculum developers may determine that it is important for all students to learn about WWI, but teachers’ pedagogical choices will impact how students come to understand the war.
Beyond the imposition of the official curriculum, there exists a hidden curriculum (Eisner, 1985) in schools that is imparted through policies and practices. Consider, for example, how dress codes, reporting practices, or the daily singing of the national anthem in schools promotes particular norms and values.
Moreover, the null curriculum (Eisner, 1985) also imparts values to/on students. That is, the stories we omit, ignore, or exclude impact student understanding of who and what we value. Moreover, when a teacher avoids a topic or world event, they aren’t being neutral; they are signaling to students that the issue is unimportant.
The Status Quo is Political
The status quo, often regarded as neutral, promotes and enforces specific values. It preserves its dominance by becoming so deeply ingrained that it becomes invisible (Giroux, 2019). As a result, some societal practices are deemed “natural” or “neutral”, while anything that challenges these expectations is labelled political.
There is a misguided and unfortunate tendency in our society to believe that activities that strengthen or maintain the status quo are neutral or at least non- political, while activities that critique or challenge the status quo are “political” and inappropriate (Ross & Vinson, 2013, p.23).
Those that label certain topics in the classroom “political” or “ideological” not only misunderstand the impossibility of neutrality, they ignore its imposition.
In the current context, curriculum materials that reinforce societal norms about gender are positioned as neutral. Whereas, materials that challenge current understandings of masculinity and femininity, or that represent 2SLGBTQIA+ lives, are positioned as political. Nobody launches the claim of “gender ideology” at curricular content that aligns with heteronormative understandings of gender and sexuality.
Yet, this content is undeniably value laden; it upholds the status quo. Labelling some content political or ideological promotes the idea that a neutral curriculum is possible. It is a political tactic that is used to secure existing power structures under the veil of neutrality and to make topics that challenge the status quo taboo or dangerous.
Not Desirable
Those arguing that education should be neutral are really arguing for a version of education in which nobody is accountable.
-Giroux, 2019
The expectation that a teacher should be neutral “should nag at the ethical soul of any educator” (Heybach, 2014, p.47). Why, Heybach (2014) asks “would teachers adhere to the metaphor of a disengaged gear—one sitting there with the potential to move, but instead resting in place? (p.47). The act of doing or saying nothing is not a neutral position. Students learn from a teacher’s unwillingness to take a side, or to adopt an ethical stance, or to take action in the face of injustice.
There are topics that require teachers to take a clear stance. It is unfathomable, for example, to think that a teacher would take a neutral, or “both sides,’ stance on slavery, or gender based sexual violence, or residential schools. As Elie Wiesel poignantly states: “We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” There are consequences to remaining neutral; inaction leaves an impression.
If a teacher refuses to take a position in order to appear neutral, they risk legitimizing an illegitimate position, making someone’s humanity debatable, or undermining enshrined human rights.
Open or Closed?
While some topics require teachers to take a clear stance, there are many topics that benefit from open deliberation and discussion between all members of the classroom community. Teachers must determine whether an issue should be considered “open” or “closed” (Journell, 2018). In the case that a topic is legally or scientifically closed, teachers should take a clear stance. Drawing on Journell (2018), teachers can ask the following questions to determine whether a topic is open or closed:
• Would having this discussion/debate lend legitimacy to an unfounded position?
• Are positions on all sides supported by evidence?
• Have (legal/scientific) experts already determined this issue is closed?
• Will inviting this discussion/debate harm students in my class?
• Do any of the viewpoints infringe on public values, such as those enshrined in human rights legislation, The Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and the UN Conventions on the Rights of the Child, which Canada ratified in 1991?
In the case that a topic is societally closed—for example, women’s suffrage—presenting the topic as open or debatable would lend legitimacy to an unfounded position, invite harm through the discussion itself, and infringe on enshrined public values. Even if a teacher feigns “neutrality” within this debate, the decision to hold the debate in the first place implies that the issue is open to debate, which itself reflects a particular stance.
Conclusion
There is as much dogma in neutrality as there is in an overtly political stance.
Recognizing the impossibility of neutrality is not a license to impose one’s view on students. Rather, it is about recognizing that everything we do is ideologically imbued, and thoughtfully considering the impacts of our pedagogical choices.
– Originally published in the Winter 2025 issue of the MB Teacher
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Shannon Moore taught social studies and English in public schools in Vancouver prior to joining the U of M Faculty of Education, where she teaches media education, social studies education, and social justice pedagogy. She also co-hosts Public Good, a podcast about public education, and is a founding member of People for Public Education.