CINCINNATI-As pupils return from summer vacation, Citizens for Community Values (CCV) has served notice to school boards in Ohio that they will be examining their curriculums and policies to determine if they are directly or inadvertently promoting homosexual agendas to their students.
Under the Freedom of Information Act, CCV in June filed documents requesting that schools submit “all their curriculums that had to do with sex ed. and homosexuality,” CCV Vice-president David Miller said. The community group also requested “all of their school policies that have to deal with sexual orientation.”
CCV compiled a report entitled “The Legal Liability Associated with Homosexuality Education in Public Schools” which was sent in June to school board presidents and superintendents around the state.
CCV contends that under the guise of tolerance, homosexual activist organizations have made significant inroads in promoting their agendas on Ohio’s elementary and especially high school campuses. And CCV President Phil Burress believes that school systems are leaving themselves wide open to potential lawsuits because of it.
Christian Citizen, USA has obtained a copy of a letter Burress and CCV sent to former Superintendent of Cincinnati City Schools Steven Adamowski (who retired this summer to take a position elsewhere). A portion of the letter states: “We are concerned that by allowing access by homosexual activist organizations, and by establishing policies that have the effect of normalizing homosexual behavior, school districts may have become responsible for physical and emotional harm to the students entrusted to their care.”
Burress identifies two such organizations, which he says have become increasingly active on school campuses - the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) and Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (P-FLAG). Burress said that these groups and others like them seek to foster the belief that the only way homosexual students can feel safe in their school environment “is to teach everyone in the K-12 school system - administrators, teachers, and students - that homosexual behavior is normal, healthy, and natural.”
The letter cautions that “What is becoming increasingly clear, however, is that the “safe school” message of these organizations is nothing more than a deceptive ploy designed to…encourage sexual activities that are quite unsafe.”
Many schools in Cincinnati, such as Walnut Hills High School, have or have had clubs for gays and their supporters such as the “Gay-Straight Alliance.” Burress warned school officials “You, your staff, or school should be aware it is possible a legal liability exists for the tort of negligence if it is proven that homosexual activist organizations were granted access to students …and that students subsequently suffered physical or mental harm” due to that access.
CCV is also concerned that the constitutional rights of heterosexual students, including Christians, may be being violated by schools whose policies and programs encourage and/ or legitimize homosexual behavior or -through Anti-Harassment Codes - prevent students from expressing their beliefs that homosexuality is a sin and morally wrong.
The report and letters were sent to each of Ohio’s 613 superintendents and school board presidents as well as school board members.
Miller said that to date, CCV has received responses to their informational request from only about half of the state’s school districts. Of those, Miller said only eight school districts have sections of their school policies devoted to “sexual orientation.” Miller also said the prevalence of homosexual clubs on school campuses is yet to be determined.
Of the remaining 50 percent of the state school districts who have yet to reply to CCV’s Freedom of Information Request, Miller said, “the question is, are they refusing to reply because they support having homosexuality as part of their programs and policies?”
Miller said CCV intends to send a follow-up request for public records to those schools that have not yet complied.
“This fall, as school starts back up, we will push this issue back into the forefront,” Miller said, adding that CCV plans to go to local school board meetings and make personal presentations “to discuss these issues face-to-face.”
“You know, we don’t allow smoking sections in schools anymore - there are no ‘Marlboro Clubs’ or ‘Skoal Clubs.’ But we’re allowing Gay/Straight Alliances and homosexual clubs? These can lead kids into an activity that’s up to three times deadlier than tobacco. Why are we allowing this? Let’s put the hard questions to these school board officials.”
CCV’s report on “Homosexuality Education” was sent to school boards in other states as well. The Portage, MI Board of Education quoted directly from the report when making a unanimous statement to the press as to why they should not pass a policy that would have elevated homosexuality to protected class status. Conversely, a Fairfax, VA school board intended to pass such a policy because they said they feared lawsuits by homosexual groups if they did not do so. However, after receiving the CCV report, the school board voted to table the issue indefinitely, saying its passage would likely result in lawsuits as well.
In his letter, Burress challenged school officials to “examine the relationship of the schools in your district to homosexual activist organizations like GLSEN and P-FLAG. And then, ask the tough question: Have the programs and policies put in place as a result of the encouragement or threats of these organizations, and the student alliances or clubs encouraged and/ or supported by [them], directly or indirectly lured the students under your care into those dangerous behaviors?”