Lake County School District GSA lawsuit will move forward

Leesburg – Looks like the proposed Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) at Carver Middle School will get its day in court.

Federal District Judge William Terrell Hodges is allowing a lawsuit fighting for the GSA to move forward. Hodges issued an order March 6 denying the Lake County School District’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), on behalf of several Carver Middle School Students, filed the lawsuit against the Lake County School District in December of 2013. Judge Hodges’ order is in response to a Feb. 10 hearing at the United States District Court Middle District of Florida, Ocala Division. The order also dismisses a motion for an injunction which would have allowed the GSA to meet right away.

According to the ACLU, the next step is for both sides to exchange evidence. Dan Tilley, ACLU of Florida LGBT rights staff attorney, said the school board’s efforts to block the lawsuit are an example of why the GSA is so needed.

“All across the country, LGBT students are subject to serious bullying and harassment, and the students who make up the GSA at Carver are working to be a part of the solution by doing something that multiple studies have proven to work. Instead of supporting them, the school board is ignoring the problem, and in doing so, participating in it,” Tilley said in a media release. “Judge Hodges was right to throw out their motion to dismiss, and though we are disappointed that he also denied our motion for preliminary injunction, we look forward to continuing to make the case for why these brave kids should be allowed to stand up to the bullies.”

The Lake County school district would not discuss the case.

“The School District declines commenting on pending litigation,” said Christopher Patton, Lake County Schools communications officer, in an email responding to Watermark’s request for an interview.

This is the second lawsuit in a year brought forth by Carver Middle School students attempting to form a GSA. In the first suit, the ACLU represented openly bisexual Bayli Silberstein, who at the time was a 14-year-old eighth grader at Carver Middle School. After months of legal wrangling and school board meeting debates, a judge granted Silberstein permission to form the club for the remainder of her 8th grade year, which ended in the summer of 2013.

That settlement has expired, Bayli has moved onto high school and now, the GSA no longer meets at Carver Middle School. Before the club became inactive, Hannah Faughan, a 12-year-old seventh grader, and her friends tried to keep it going but ran into administrative roadblocks similar to the ones Silberstein faced.

In August of 2013, the Lake County School Board approved a new policy that would require all existing middle school clubs to reapply and meet new requirements. Faughan and her friends reapplied in October, and in December, after several attempts to find out the status of the GSA, they were informed by the school board’s attorney that the Superintendent had denied their application, claiming the GSA was not an extension of the school’s curriculum and therefore would not be permitted to meet and operate as a school club. According to the ACLU, the District had already approved a number of non-curricular clubs at this point and that’s when they sued the district.

Unlike the current lawsuit, the first lawsuit was settled quickly and out of court. In an interview with Watermark, Tilly said the school board is taking it to court this time because there’s been a change in state law that would “permit [the school board] to discriminate where they couldn’t’ discriminate before.”

Tilley is referring to Senate Bill 1076, which went into effect July 1, 2013. Two of Lake County’s School Board members, Tod Howard and Bill Mathias, successfully lobbied the Florida Legislature in Tallahassee to change state law and remove the definition of “secondary schools,” which had previous been defined as grades 6–12. Tilley said Howard and Mathias are relying on the state to say The Federal Access Act, which requires secondary schools to provide equal access to extracurricular clubs, doesn’t apply, but the ACLU’s view is that secondary schools do include middle schools.

He added that the ACLU also has a first amendment claim in the case, as well.

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