Family To Quit Virginia Over Title IX Probe Alleging Harassment of a Girl in High School Boys’ Locker Room

The family of a Virginia high school student is packing up and leaving the state because of a Title IX investigation into his and two other boys’ expressions of discomfort at the presence of a biological female in the boys’ locker room. Loudoun County Public Schools launched its investigation after a female student, who identifies as male, entered the boys’ locker room at Stone Bridge High School in March and filmed them as they questioned why a girl was there. The female student alleged that the three boys made “disparaging comments and physical threats.”The investigation has been labeled a “misuse of authority” by Virginia’s attorney general, Jason Miyares, and the school district has been accused of religious discrimination. The mother of one of the students still under investigation, Renae Smith, told the Sun that her family is leaving the state because of the treatment her son has received from the school district. “We have made the heartbreaking decision to relocate our family out of Virginia. After months of an unprecedented Title IX investigation that treated our son like a threat for simply expressing his Christian beliefs about biology, we no longer feel Loudoun County Public Schools can provide a safe or fair environment,” Ms. Smith said. She added, “Protecting our children’s wellbeing and their right to speak the truth must come first, and we continue to call on LCPS and all school districts to respect parents, uphold due process, and stop weaponizing Title IX against free speech.”Ms. Smith told a TV station at Washington, WJLA, that she believed her family’s decision to leave the state would lead the district to drop the charges against her son. During a recent presentation to the LCPS school board, the Title IX coordinator, Christopher Moy, told parents that he has “discretionary dismissal where I can dismiss the report because I no longer have control over that person.”However, Mr. Moy told Ms. Smith in an email message that even though she was pulling her son from the school district and leaving, the investigation would continue. “After careful consideration of the status of the investigation and consistent with our practice, I have determined that the grievance process will continue,” Mr. Moy said in the email message.Ms. Smith has expressed concern that the school district is determined to find her son liable for sexual harassment, which might harm his college admissions prospects. She previously told the Sun that even if her son was not found liable, she fears he would be targeted in other ways by the school district in the future. LCPS did not respond to the Sun’s request for comment by the time of publication. While LCPS has previously declined to comment on the specifics of the case, it has claimed that the media and others are “exploiting” the story “without full knowledge” of the matter.However, the probe has sparked criticism from state officials and questions have been raised about the facts of the case. The video, filmed by the female student and released in May, did not show that the male students made any disparaging or threatening remarks.Additionally, an investigation by Mr. Miyares’s office failed to find “any outside corroboration” of the claim that the male students made threats or harassing comments. The report indicated that there may have been “exculpatory” evidence deleted by school officials investigating the allegations.The investigation also found that the female student previously filed a “false or unfounded Title IX complaint” against two of the students under investigation for the locker room encounter and questioned LCPS’s ability to detect false complaints.LCPS has a policy that lets students use the locker room that aligns with their gender identity, but prohibits recording in locker rooms. The female student was given an in-school suspension for filming the male students, according to Mr. Miyares’s report. About two weeks after Mr. Miyares’s report was released, LCPS dropped its charge of sexual harassment against one of the students, who is Muslim, but declined to drop the charges against the two other students, who are Christian.In announcing the decision to drop the charges against the one student, the school’s Title IX coordinator said that the “conduct alleged would not constitute sexual harassment as defined in 34 CFR § 106.30 of the Title IX regulations, even if proved.”Mr. Miyares referred the LCPS matter to the federal government, and the Department of Education has launched an investigation.

Family To Quit Virginia Over Title IX Probe Alleging Harassment of a Girl in High School Boys’ Locker Room

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