Putting up signage that represents only sexual minority groups is not “inclusive,” parents told New Jersey’s Long Valley Middle School.
For about five years, the middle school posted square signs showing a rainbow triangle outside many of its classrooms, parents said. This designated the classrooms as a “safe space” for LGBT students.
But the school lacked signage declaring any “safe spaces” for other groups, said local Board of Education member John Holly. And for this reason, the rainbow triangle signs violated the school’s policies.
“They’re saying that these stickers are safe spaces for some kids, but our view was the classrooms in our schools need to be safe spaces for all kids,” Holly told The Epoch Times, noting that he is giving his personal opinion and not speaking in his capacity as a board member or military officer.
Long Valley Middle School’s online “Vision” page announces that the school “values diversity. Furthermore, its township school board’s first goal is to monitor the school to create a plan that “embraces the diversity of all students.”
The school has an LGBT club called Free 2 Be for sixth to eighth grade students.
But its failure to sufficiently encourage non-LGBT students left the school open to many legal troubles, Holly said.
The rainbow triangle signs were supposed to prevent bullying and self-harm, he explained, but, ironically, this also suggested certain parts of the school might be open to these activities.
“What happens when a kid goes into a classroom when there’s no sticker? Does that room become unsafe?” he asked.
“What about the school buses? There’s no stickers on the school buses.”
Even worse, if a child not included in the sticker self-harmed or experienced bullying, it suggested the school didn’t mind, said Holly.
“Are we not opening ourselves to a massive lawsuit for preferential treatment of this group of kids as opposed to another group?” he asked.
Political Pressure
The rainbow signs also made school employment political, Holly said. The principal of the school had a pro-LGBT sticker on his office door. But not all teachers did.
“Imagine if your boss is putting his politics on his door, and you happen to not agree with that,” Holly said. “It’s difficult for [employees] to raise their voice on an issue like that when their boss has clearly chosen sides.”
Holly voiced his concerns in a school board meeting alongside other parents.
“Pushing ideology while people are teaching your kids is wrong,” he told the school board on Dec. 13, 2022.
In the same meeting, he noted that the last six accusations of bullying the school dealt with did not touch on sexual preference.
Another parent, Matt Hackenberg, said he supported children learning about LGBT issues, but deemed the stickers inappropriate.
“Kids need to learn about their sexuality and things like that,” he said. “Everyone needs to just get along. Let’s stop creating these classifications and these divisions.”
Some opposed his request.
Michelle Rupert, a mother and teacher, spoke out. “I just can’t process why any adult would want to remove a sticker that literally says ”a safe place” on it.
“As a lesbian and genderqueer individual, I can say the LGBTQ+ community is constantly bullied and belittled in our school system,” stated Rose, a Long Valley student.
“The safe zone rainbow stickers let kids like me know that they are not alone despite their differences.”
Voicing Values
According to local parent Meghan Teeling, many parents felt disturbed by their children’s exposure to LGBT ideology.
“A lot of this is a social contagion,” she said. “When they are treated as a special, prioritized group, I think you’ve got kids that are influenced in a way that they otherwise wouldn’t be,” she said.
The stickers were yet another example of an LGBT ideology seemingly eager to thrust itself into every child’s life, Teeling said.
Watching banners with political messages unfurl over places where children go to school bothered her.
“It’s just not appropriate, and it favors one particular group and ideology,” Teeling said.
If the school intended to prevent self-harm and bullying, its standard programs should be enough, she added, questioning why a particular group needed its symbol in most of the school’s classrooms.
“I don’t have any disrespect for anyone who feels that way,” Teeling said. “I just don’t feel it’s the public school’s place to be forcing that upon my child or anyone else’s. It doesn’t align with our family’s values.”
Even so, parents didn’t expect to win the fight to remove them, she said.
“We just kept fighting because these are our kids,” she said. “These are the students that my children are going to have as peers.”
Teeling, Holly, and local Cassie Anderson said Long Valley Middle School told them placing the stickers in school was a student-led effort.
Superintendent Peter Turnamian told parents the initiative was student-led, said Anderson.
Still, they strongly suspected the students themselves didn’t have much to do with it.
Holly noted the rainbow signs weren’t just in places where students had access. Some were in faculty rooms. Others were in the teachers’ conference room. They looked professionally designed and were laminated.
“You’re gonna tell me that the students put up that flag in the conference room for the teachers?” Holly asked.
The Epoch Times couldn’t find where these stickers might be available online.
“How do students get these types of things implemented? Why did they have to do this?” Anderson said she asked faculty. “We never got straight answers. And that bothered many of us.”
What Makes Something Inclusive?
Teeling said she would understand putting up special stickers for one group of children if they were experiencing more bullying than others. But to her knowledge, that was not the case with Long Valley middle schoolers.
“I would venture to guess that that’s probably not the situation,” she said.
Teeling said she saw flags for new gender identities like “pansexual,” “demisexual,” and “aromantic” in the school’s display cases but doesn’t know how many children in the school of 800 even identify as such.
“It pushes beyond teaching a message of inclusivity and respect, and goes into an area that I just don’t feel is appropriate for our educators to be pushing on kids,” she added.
Anderson also noted that Long Valley deployed the rainbow stickers while it struggled to keep up with basic education.
“Get the focus off the sex and put it back on academics,” she said.
The signs were taken down over winter break.In response to parents’ requests, Long Valley Middle School changed its poster strategy. It now shows its commitment to helping all students by using a likeness of its school mascot, a panther, Turnamian announced at a board meeting two weeks ago.
“We did get clarity on legal opinion and counsel on whether or not the placards and flags should remain up or come down, and I remained engaged with our legal team throughout the break,” he said.
Turnamian noted the LGBT rainbow signage left the school vulnerable to accusations of point of view favoritism.
The new picture would be “a more common symbol that’s developed by our students with feedback from our school community and is aligned and born from our SEL (Social Emotional Learning) ongoing Social Emotional Learning work,” he told the meeting.
The Epoch Times reached out to Long Valley Middle School, but they declined comment.
