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Gay-rights club may meet at Boyd HighSettlement ends student group's 2-year struggleBy MARK PITSCH, The Courier-Journal from the Web, February 3, 2004 ASHLAND, Ky. - In a victory for a student gay-rights group, the Boyd County school board agreed last night to let the group meet at Boyd County High School and to sponsor anti-harassment workshops for students and employees. In exchange, the American Civil Liberties Union agreed to drop a lawsuit against the county. The lawsuit, which had been scheduled for trial in April, argued that the school district violated the federal Equal Access Act by refusing to let the high school's Gay-Straight Alliance meet on school grounds. "We think this has worked out beautifully for everyone involved," said Chris Hampton, public education associate at the ACLU's Lesbian and Gay Rights Project in New York. "The students will get to have their club without any illegal restrictions. The school hasn't had to pay any money damages and will be doing great and needed training." School board member Teresa Cornette said: "It's time to move on. All of our students are important." The access law states that if a school district allows one student group to meet on campus, it can't prohibit other groups from using school facilities because of religion, political orientation or philosophy. After meeting behind closed doors for about two hours last night to discuss the settlement, the board voted 5-0 to accept the terms of a consent decree that will be presented to U.S. District Judge David L. Bunning by both sides no later than tomorrow. The settlement calls for the high school group to be able to meet on school grounds and to be treated like all other non-curricular student groups. It also says that the district will sponsor anti-harassment training - with an emphasis on combating bias based on sexual orientation - for high school and middle school students and for all district employees. The Anti-Defamation League, which has an office in Cleveland, will conduct the training. School district administrators also will undergo training to be able to hold anti-harassment workshops for officials in other districts. The district will pay the legal fees of the ACLU, which declined to disclose the amount. The settlement will be in effect for three years. The plaintiffs in the suit - seven students, their parents and Kaye King, an English teacher and the alliance's adviser - will not be paid anything. The alliance isn't asking the district for funding, but will receive the same access to school facilities as other non-academic groups. "The kids just wanted the (alliance) to be able to meet in their school and that's what they're getting," Hampton said. Lisa Soronen, a lawyer for the National School Boards Association, said school districts typically have had a hard time fighting lawsuits based on the federal access act. "It sounds to me like the result is reasonable and based on an analysis of the case law, which has not been favorable to districts that oppose gay-straight alliances," Soronen said yesterday when told of the agreement. "I think the district is probably cutting its losses and realizing that taking this farther was going to cost more money and perhaps not be successful." The settlement resolves a nearly two-year effort by Boyd County students to form a gay-rights organization that would meet at the high school. After previously rejecting applications from the alliance starting in the spring of 2002, the high school's teacher-parent council voted 3-2 in October of that year to let the group meet on campus. But the decision sparked student protests, including a boycott by 435 of the school's 974 students. A group of local ministers also organized community opposition to the group. The school board voted in December 2002 to ban all non-curricular clubs from meeting at the high school, saying it wanted to revise its student clubs policy. A month later the ACLU sued the district. The suit argued that the high school violated the access act by allowing some non-curricular clubs to meet but not the alliance. It also said the district's ban targeted the alliance. In April 2003, Bunning issued an injunction that ordered the school to let the alliance meet on campus. He also said the alliance likely would prevail at a trial. Bunning didn't rule on other arguments in the case. The suit claimed that the school failed to protect alliance members from harassment and violated their First Amendment rights and that the district violated the Kentucky Education Reform Act when it voted to ban clubs because such decisions are to be left to individual school councils. Meanwhile, the district and the ACLU began negotiations toward a settlement. Tamara Lange, an ACLU lawyer, said a break came in December when Bunning held a mediation session. "I think both the school district and the students involved in the case really wanted to put this controversy behind them and move to a more harmonious place," Lange said. "The school was willing to bend on some things and the students were willing to bend on some things that allowed for a compromise." Andrea Hildebran, executive director of the Kentucky Fairness Alliance, said the agreement will send a message to school boards across the state that they need to be leaders in preventing any anti-gay bias in schools. "The students and teachers at Boyd County who have insisted their rights be protected have done a service to the whole state by raising awareness of the violence and harassment students face in the schools in so many instances," Hildebran said. |
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