When Colin Tanner and Amber Ruel won this year's theatre competition at their Milwaukee high school, they felt they were on the brink of making a difference. Their prizes included seeing their plays performed at school. Both plays were commended for being well-written and for their messages of tolerance. According to Pius XI High's principal Richard Pendergast, though, tolerance has no place on the school stage.

Ruel's Scene 6 is about a school pariah who guns down his tormentors. Tanner's Oh No, a Negro looks at a white neighbourhood considering lynching a black man who moved onto their block. Tanner wanted to spotlight Milwaukee's racial segregation; Ruel, the need for understanding in the school microcosm. Pendergast finds the plays unfit for student viewing, insisting student-playwrights are "learning what we are teaching them."

"If you put no limits," asked Pendergast, "then what are we teaching?"

Despite Pendergast's objections, the shows will go on: a Milwaukee community theatre has offered its stage to both students.

» Scott Saxon