Thank you, Neil Hunter, headteacher of Blatchington Mill School, for helping me to decide which secondary school to recommend to my friends and to send any children I have in the future.

The suspension of some of those students involved in the anti-war walk-outs reveals the current regime at your school to be heavy-handed and illiberal.

Even if the students' action marks a "culmination of events", such a protest should not have been the subject of punishment - quite the reverse.

People around Brighton and Hove have expressed admiration for the initiative and concern exhibited by these young people at a time when we are constantly told teenagers no longer care about politics and the wider world.

Moreover, your argument that the young people should have stuck to a petition suggests their understanding of political processes, history and international relations is more acute than yours, especially at this time.

It is numbers on the streets that influence those in power, not petitions.

-Dr John Drury, lecturer in social psychology, School of Social Sciences, University of Sussex