A majority of the nine public speakers who addressed Alamance-Burlington school board members Monday night about the new Title IX policy adopted two weeks ago said they support the expanded protections against discrimination and harassment based on gender identity and sexual orientation (see related story, this edition).
Title IX was passed by Congress in 1972 and was intended to guarantee female students have the same educational and athletic opportunities as male students in K-12 schools, colleges, and universities.
The U.S. Department of Education issued new Title IX regulations – which federal education officials say will ensure that students and employees “receive appropriate support if they experience sex discrimination” in an educational setting – in April 2024 and gave K-12 schools, colleges, and universities an August 1 deadline to comply.
Among those who weighed in on the new Title IX policy for ABSS Monday night were two candidates for county commissioner (a Democrat and a Republican), one school board candidate, two LGBTQ advocates, and several parents of current and former ABSS students.
In all, 17 people spoke Monday night during the public comments period, which ran just shy of an hour and touched on other concerns such as: as facility conditions; the lack of WiFi hotspots on the first day of school for students at the Alamance Virtual School; and military recruitment efforts in ABSS.
“I can tell you, as someone raised around gay people, I know exactly what the gay agenda is: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. You are going to be pressured by people who want you to reject federal funds so we don’t have to comply with Title IX…But it’s not really about the money. It’s about a group of extremists who want to destroy public education as we know it. Don’t let them.”
– Chris Smith
Chris Smith, a Democratic candidate running for one of three available seats on Alamance County’s board of commissioners in the general election, told the board Monday night, “There are some in this country that want to fight a culture war in our classrooms, and that is wrong.”
Describing himself as a Christian and a loving and supportive father of a 20-year-old transgender child, Smith told the school board: “I can tell you, as someone raised around gay people, I know exactly what the gay agenda is: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. You are going to be pressured by people who want you to reject federal funds so we don’t have to comply with Title IX…But it’s not really about the money. It’s about a group of extremists who want to destroy public education as we know it. Don’t let them.”
Camille Mikkelsen described the expansion of Title IX as “a very standard policy update” and the debate surrounding it as a waste of time that could be better spent. “It is all of our children that matter, and when we focus on gender politics, we are taking away time we could be spending helping them to be better people,” she said during the school board’s public comments period Monday night.
Theresa Draughn, who described herself as the parent of four ABSS students, said, “right now, there’s no denying everything feels really divisive. They deserve all the funding and more inclusion; one kid being more included does not make [another] feel less included. Everybody goes home to their families, and we all live a different way – and that’s okay.”
“The last four years have kind of been chaos: Covid hit, mold-gate hit. I think the biggest thing our kids need [is] to feel safe and welcome; they shouldn’t be fearful. If members on the school board are pushing a narrative and making our kids feel unsafe, that’s not okay. It endangers those kids.”
– Brandy Whittaker
Brandy Whittaker, who has two children in ABSS, reminded the board Monday night, “The last four years have kind of been chaos: Covid hit, mold-gate hit. I think the biggest thing our kids need [is] to feel safe and welcome; they shouldn’t be fearful. If members on the school board are pushing a narrative and making our kids feel unsafe, that’s not okay. It endangers those kids.”
“Research has shown that, when we’re doing sexual violence prevention, we’re also doing LGBTQ inclusion work and vice versa.”
– Becca Bisphoric Patterson
Becca Bisphoric Patterson, who described herself as an expert in “fields of sexual violence prevention response and LGBTQ inclusion,” told the board that numerous studies have shown that when LGBTQ youth are loved and protected, it reduces the likelihood of sexual violence. “Research has shown that, when we’re doing sexual violence prevention, we’re also doing LGBTQ inclusion work and vice versa,” she said.
Patterson also took aim at critics’ belief that, because of these new Title IX regulations, girls will be less safe. “Not only does this hyper-sexualize and demonize our LGBTQ youth in a dangerous way, it’s fundamentally misunderstanding of how sexual violence happens,” she said.
“Sexual violence in our schools and in our communities is largely perpetrated by people our kids know,” Patterson said. “It’s not because we don’t understand gender and identity. It’s because we allow norms to occur and be supported that allow some people to be less than others. We know that LGBTQ youth are twice as likely to experience sexual violence than even our young girls when policies don’t protect them. I work with Title IX daily; it’s about gender equity, not [showing preference for] any sex over others. We’re not asking for more for any group – only equal treatment. These policies protect all children.”
“I’m also a transgender person, and I work frequently with LGBTQ students and community members, frequently through the organization Trans in Alamance, which supports trans youth and adults here in Alamance County and people like me who live and work in our community. I think it’s really important you continue to uphold these Title IX protections, to provide crucial resources for students, and strive for equity in our school system.”
– Dr. Archie Crowley
Dr. Archie Crowley – an assistant professor of English at Elon University specializing in “sociolinguistics and trans, nonbinary, queer linguistics” – said, “I’m also a transgender person, and I work frequently with LGBTQ students and community members, frequently through the organization Trans in Alamance, which supports trans youth and adults here in Alamance County and people like me who live and work in our community.
“I think it’s really important you continue to uphold these Title IX protections, to provide crucial resources for students, and strive for equity in our school system,” Crowley told the board Monday night. “As we’ve noted, rejecting Title IX would put the school system at risk for losing resources for the schools. The people opposing this are even willing to deny the schools by stoking fear and using LGBT students as political pawns, trying to get us to turn against the students more generally instead of joining together to support the students in the school system. I think it’s really important to not use marginalized students as pawns and ultimately prioritize continuing to support equity in the school system.”
‘We are seeing darkness’
On the other hand, opponents of the new Title IX regulations skewered the school board’s decision to adopt the policy on August 13 without giving the public any opportunity to comment.
Ed Priola, a Republican candidate for one of the three commissioner seats in the fall general election, criticized the school board for relying solely on the advice of their attorney, whom he described as “insufficiently versed in the level of controversy surrounding the new policy revisions.”
“Good government is supposed to be open and transparent. You knew that, yet you adopted the new policy without public feedback. This body elected to violate the public’s trust, and that is unacceptable.”
– Ed Priola
Priola pointed to the 26 states that have filed lawsuits challenging the new Title IX revisions, telling the board Monday night, “You elected to endorse a redefinition of sex discrimination to include, among other things, a student’s preferred gender identity. According to those state lawsuits, that requirement will result in compelled speech by students, staff, and teachers. If you are a teacher and misgender someone, you can lose your job; if you are a student, you can be expelled.”
“Good government is supposed to be open and transparent,” Priola said. “You knew that, yet you adopted the new policy without public feedback. This body elected to violate the public’s trust, and that is unacceptable.”
School board candidate Corrie Shepherd told the board Monday night, “You implied that you had no choice, but that simply isn’t true.
“You implied that you had no choice, but that simply isn’t true. The vast majority of N.C. school districts, despite the August 1 deadline, have decided to choose another option. Out of the 115 school districts in this state, you were the second only behind Wake County to implement this policy. Most other districts, including some of the most liberal in the state, have decided to wait and see what happens in the courts.”
– Corrie Shepherd
“The vast majority of N.C. school districts, despite the August 1 deadline, have decided to choose another option,” Shepherd said, citing Asheville city schools and Transylvania County schools as two examples of N.C. public school systems that have delayed adopting a new Title IX policy. “Out of the 115 school districts in this state, you were the second only behind Wake County to implement this policy. Most other districts, including some of the most liberal in the state, have decided to wait and see what happens in the courts.”
Shepherd told the board that she’d heard from many ABSS parents and teachers who are concerned about the Title IX policy but have chosen to remain silent because they fear retribution at work, or that their child may be treated unfairly at school. “I have been praying about what I wanted to say tonight because I am angry,” she added. “I apologize if I’m harsh with you, because I’m sincerely frustrated. I really think you can do better…than just doing what you are told to do.”
“If we sacrifice our children’s well-being, their safety, their identities to get federal funding, that’s exploitation. I want to encourage you all to stand up for what’s right, for protecting our children. Our children are suffering.”
– Kelly Stutts
Kelly Stutts told the board Monday night, “I believe that we are born a male or a female, and I believe we learn that in biology. I am concerned with what’s going to take place if we go along with what the federal government says. If we’re going to bow down to the federal government because of money, do you know what that’s called? That’s called exploitation.
“If we sacrifice our children’s well-being, their safety, their identities to get federal funding, that’s exploitation,” said Stutts. “I want to encourage you all to stand up for what’s right, for protecting our children. Our children are suffering. They have experienced trauma we never had growing up. We all experienced trauma in 2020; and our children were isolated, put behind a screen, taken away from people. We are seeing the effect of it; we are seeing confusion; we are seeing a darkness that has overcome them. We’ve got to help them out of it.
“We’ve had a lot of issues with confusion about sex, and we’ve had a lot issues with school employees being inappropriate with children; it’s not just the children who are having trouble,” Stutts added. “We can’t get into these false narratives that we get to choose who we are as far as gender, because that’s based on emotions, and emotions change. Emotions lie. There is no evidence that medical intervention benefits gender-distressed young people – what the kids need is counseling…We are all being bullied by the federal government. We have to say no to that.”
The Alamance News had asked ABSS officials last week for a list of N.C. school systems that have adopted a new Title IX policy that complies with the regulations issued in April by the federal education department. The newspaper has not yet received a response.
