iowa city <u+2014> the air felt leaden in the hallways at west high school on the morning after election day. the usual clatter from the building<u+2019>s 2,000 students was muffled. at lunchtime, lujayn hamad was in the cafeteria when she said a boy she barely knew roughly bumped into her and swore at her. <u+201c>go back home,<u+201d> he told ms. hamad, who is 15, and an american citizen, and wears a hijab. the comment, overheard by a friend at ms. hamad<u+2019>s side <u+2014> though denied by the male student <u+2014> set off a turbulent week of tears, fury and demonstrations at west high, a large public school in this university town, which prides itself on its openness and progressivism. minorities make up nearly 40 percent of the student body at west high, a far more diverse mix than the typical iowan school. in the hours and days after ms. hamad<u+2019>s encounter in the cafeteria, similar incidents followed, students said. one girl said she was surrounded by heckling students and called a terrorist. another said she saw people chanting <u+201c>trump<u+201d> in the hallways when they passed black students. in one classroom, a student noted the absence of a latino classmate and announced to the others, <u+201c>i wonder if she got deported.<u+201d> like many other schools around the country since the election, west high has become a microcosm of the united states itself, a place roiled by tension, divisions and mistrust. students in many schools say supporters of donald j. trump have felt empowered to lash out at minorities, while outraged backers of hillary clinton have been spurred to organize and demonstrate. and teachers have been struggling to provide guidance even as they themselves are processing the election results. in ladue, mo., a suburb of st. louis, students walked out of a high school twice in a week to protest racist comments made at school after the election of mr. trump. two students were disciplined for telling black students boarding a bus that they should sit in the back. swastikas were drawn in a boys<u+2019> bathroom at a middle school in bethesda, md., which has many jewish students. children all over the country, particularly latinos and muslims, have fearfully asked teachers and guidance counselors whether they and their families will be deported. the southern poverty law center, which has been tracking thousands of such episodes since the election, said the most commonly reported locations for harassment were k-12 schools. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s impossible to wall schools off from the rest of society,<u+201d> said maureen costello, the director of teaching tolerance, a program of the law center. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s just seeped into the culture. kids are hearing it at home and they<u+2019>re amplifying it.<u+201d> at west high, some teachers and parents have encouraged students to walk out of class to protest racism and sexism and to support a pluralistic society. others were livid at the protests, saying the teenagers were overreacting. some emailed administrators to ask why some students were allowed to skip class for protests during a crucial finals week. a few teachers have responded by hugging crying students and reassuring them that they are loved. one assured an emotional student that orchestra class <u+201c>is a safe space where we can all get together and make music,<u+201d> the student said. but an english teacher announced, to the dismay of some teenagers in her class, that the election was over and <u+201c>we<u+2019>re not going to talk about it.<u+201d> everybody seems to agree that the school is a changed place. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s a different environment now,<u+201d> said jade merriwether, 16. <u+201c>i feel very upset and afraid for my friends. people are using the election as an excuse to discriminate against each other openly.<u+201d> even trump supporters say they feel under siege. two girls walked into the principal<u+2019>s office after the election and told him that as conservatives, they did not feel safe walking through the halls, were receiving dirty looks and felt they were not <u+201c>on an equal basis<u+201d> to other students, the principal, gregg shoultz, said. mason hanson, 16, a member of the young republicans club, said he had publicly supported mr. trump during the campaign but was upset by the slurs directed at students in the aftermath. now other students are angrily blaming him for mr. trump<u+2019>s victory; he no longer wears his <u+201c>hillary for prison<u+201d> t-shirt because he does not want to be lumped in with the people accused of making insulting comments to minorities. <u+201c>after hearing about that stuff, i was honestly surprised,<u+201d> he said. <u+201c>i hadn<u+2019>t heard it before. usually we<u+2019>re all polite to each other.<u+201d> the trouble began at west high on wednesday morning after election day, when teachers received an email from the principal warning them: be objective about the election results and remind students of the school<u+2019>s inclusiveness. <u+201c>please be positive and strong and teach the heck out of our kids today,<u+201d> mr. shoultz wrote in the email. mr. trump<u+2019>s victory <u+201c>changed the earth that we stood on a little bit,<u+201d> mr. shoultz said in an interview. <u+201c>i had a pit in my stomach that day.<u+201d> travis henderson, a social studies teacher, arrived at school prepared to talk to his students about democracy and the importance of fidelity to its long and sometimes difficult process. <u+201c>i knew it was going to be hard, i knew it was going to take a lot of me,<u+201d> he said. <u+201c>i expected tears, i expected fear and i expected confusion.<u+201d> in her second-period class, carmen gwenigale, a spanish teacher, was faced with three students who were sobbing, distraught over the election results. she was sympathetic, but tried to stay focused on the mission of her class. <u+201c>i told them, <u+2018>do it in spanish, <u+2019> <u+201d> she said. after ms. hamad<u+2019>s encounter in the lunchroom, the first teacher she approached was ms. gwenigale. <u+201c>lujayn came to my room, crying and sobbing, questioning if she should take off her hijab,<u+201d> said ms. gwenigale, who encouraged her to tell the principal. ms. hamad said she was not ready. <u+201c>i was like, i just want to go home and talk about it,<u+201d> she said. <u+201c>talk about it with my family and my god.<u+201d> after ms. hamad left her classroom, ms. gwenigale sought out mr. henderson. <u+201c>i ran straight to his room,<u+201d> she said. they sat on the stairs in a hallway and spoke in hushed tones. <u+201c>i said, <u+2018>what are we going to do? how can we work through this?<u+2019><u+201d> the story spread around the school and reached school administrators, who questioned the male student. he denied saying anything derogatory. mr. shoultz, the principal, said video showed an encounter between the two students in the cafeteria, but did not pick up what was said. by thursday, he had made a schoolwide announcement, trying to calm tensions by telling students that discriminatory behavior would not be tolerated. a group of students decided to hold a rally the next day. they marched out of school on friday, holding signs that read <u+201c>love trumps hate,<u+201d> <u+201c>say no to deportation<u+201d> and <u+201c>no hate in our state.<u+201d> on monday, some students gathered in the cafeteria, handing out safety pins to wear on shirts in a gesture of togetherness. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s showing solidarity and unity,<u+201d> said wala siddig, a junior. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s showing that we<u+2019>re not going to tolerate all this bigotry that<u+2019>s happening.<u+201d> on tuesday, a few dozen students closed out the day with another protest. they walked out of their classes at 3:30 p.m. and gathered inside the school<u+2019>s main entrance, where they sat cross-legged with duct tape over their mouths. when the school day concluded at 4 p.m., the hallways filled with students who stopped short and stared, open-mouthed, at the group. mr. henderson, the social studies teacher, stood on the sidelines and watched the reaction. the next day, wednesday, marked one week and one day since the election. it was a scheduled day off, a quick breath between trimesters. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s good timing,<u+201d> he said. <u+201c>i think they need it.<u+201d> a version of this article appears in print on november 20, 2016, on page a1 of the new york edition with the headline: taunts and protests at a school in iowa reflect a nation<u+2019>s divide. order reprints | today's paper | subscribe
at iowa high school, election results kindle tensions and protests
julie bosman