Three middle school counselors in Amherst, Massachusetts, have been placed on administrative leave over claims they allegedly misgendered LGBT students and tried to convert them.
According to a May 9 notice to the counselors, the Amherst-Pelham Regional School initiated a Title IX complaint against the three school officials and referred the matter for federal investigation to the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Human Resources at the U.S. Department of Education.
The notice cites two separate occasions in which the counselors are accused of using the wrong gender pronouns to address a student or students.
The Amherst-Pelham Regional School has launched a Title IX investigation into the three school officials. The complaint is being handled by the school’s Office of Diversity, Equity, and Human Resources.
Amherst, once dubbed “a lesbian paradise” by Gay Travel, has been named one of the LGBT-friendliest cities in the United States.
It is home to a University of Massachusetts campus, named one of the 25 best campuses for LGBT students by Campus Pride.
Three school counselors are now under investigation in the western Massachusetts town for allegedly calling students by the wrong gender pronouns.
One of the counselors is also accused of praying to rid the school of an “LGBT gay demon that wants to attack and confuse” students.
Their attorney Ryan McLane told The Epoch Times that his clients deny the claims and any allegations of wrongdoing are part of a witch hunt by anti-Christian students and staff.
He said the counselors were targeted after they were outed as “faithful, Bible-believing Christians” and that there have yet to be any named sources behind the allegations.
The accused counselors are 8th grade counselors Hector Santos and Delinda Dykes and 7th grade counselor Tania Cabrera of the Amherst Regional Middle School (ARMS).
They have been subject to public protests including a student march and nasty emails.
In a May 10 email to the counselors, Eliza Carson, who identifies herself as an alumni of the Amherst public school system, wrote: “Your hatred and discrimination is outdated, putrid, and puny.”
“I, a lesbian, feel better now. And I hope your day is a little bit worse! This is a protest!” Carson wrote.
Even the national organization Gay Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) has chimed in on the issue.
In a written statement to the district’s superintendent and school committee, the group expressed what they called its “unequivocal support for the immediate removal” of two of the Amherst counselors.
“In addition to their immediate removal, we insist that the Amherst Regional Public School District execute a comprehensive review of their Guidance Office and Counseling programs to mitigate any further harassment,” the organization wrote.
Superintendent Michael Morris—who called the allegations “serious”—promised a thorough investigation into the activities of Santos, Cabrera, and Dykes.
McLane said the matter blew up when a group of high school students got together and wrote an article for the school newspaper The Graphic.
In the May 9 article, which ran the same day the counselors were notified of the Title IX complaint against them, the students wrote that they have “multiple sources” to back up claims that the counselors are anti-LGBT.
However, they only identify their sources with “pseudonyms.”
“The article allowed anonymity to individuals who claimed to have ‘firsthand’ information while simultaneously smearing my clients,” said Ryan.
According to the article, a school secretary, who the students assign by pseudonym “John” reported last year of “feeling a tightness in [his] chest” after attending an adult-only prayer circle Dykes and Santos held before school.
“John,” according to the article, “looked to the door, wanting to run” after one of the counselors spoke of an LGBT gay demon.
In April, a middle school parent wrote an email to school officials saying she had “secondhand information” that school counselors were “counseling queer students to deny their queer identity and to follow Christian principles.”
The parent’s email, sent on April 20, was attached to the April 25 statement by GLSEN calling for the firing of the school counselors.
More allegations based on unnamed sources came from school newspaper adviser Sara Barbara Just, also head of the high school’s English Department.
In a May 14 op-ed piece she ran in the school newspaper, she wrote: “Early digging into some concerning allegations about counselors at the middle school quickly led them to almost 30 sources who wanted to speak about so much more.”
She praised the students for their investigative piece and called them “community shepherds.”
“It has only been a few days since my journalism students at Amherst Regional High School published ‘It’s life or death’: failure to protect trans kids at ARMS a systemic problem. And in that short time, we can see that it has already begun to spark critical dialogue and necessary action,” she wrote.
