Education

Middle School Teacher Hid Complaints, Colluded With ACLU To Smear District As Anti-Gay, Report Finds

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• The ACLU Pennsylvania filed a federal complaint to the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) against a Pennsylvania school district alleging that administration was permitting discrimination against LGBTQ students and fostering a “toxic educational environment.”
• A special counsel, hired by the school board, found that allegations of harassment and the district’s failure to address such reports were misleading. 
• “While the District should always seek improvement, the picture that has been painted of the District by the ACLU and its allies is unsupported by the evidence. And it is that evidence that should continue to guide the District as it strives to serve students of all backgrounds and to provide them with nurturing places to learn, grow and thrive,” the report stated.

An internal investigation for a Pennsylvania school district released a report Thursday revealing that a middle school teacher hid complaints of LGBTQ discrimination and worked with American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to push a “false narrative” about the district.

In October 2022, the ACLU of Pennsylvania filed a federal complaint to the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) alleging that Central Bucks School District was permitting discrimination against LGBTQ students and fostering a “toxic educational environment.” Outside legal counsel and law firm Duane Morris’ report, informed by 45 interviews and more than 123,000 documents, showed that Andrew Burgess, the teacher, hid student reports of LGBTQ harassment and planned to involve the OCR because he hoped to reverse district policies which required students to receive parental permission before changing their gender.

“While the District should always seek improvement, the picture that has been painted of the District by the ACLU and its allies is unsupported by the evidence,” the report stated. “And it is that evidence that should continue to guide the District as it strives to serve students of all backgrounds and to provide them with nurturing places to learn, grow and thrive.”

In May 2022, the district suspended Burgess after he allegedly violated school policy by filing a civil rights complaint to the OCR on behalf of a transgender student. Burgess alleged to the OCR that the child was facing harassment and the administration was failing to take action.

The report, however, found that several students had reported incidents of LGBTQ harassment to Burgess, who failed to notify the district of the allegations. Instead, Burgess created a four-page dossier detailing the allegations, “actively concealed it from the school district administration” and used the collected information to file a complaint to the OCR.

The investigation concluded that Burgess “had an ulterior motive for taking these actions” and was seeking to “derail” policies adopted by the board that limited age-inappropriate material in the schools and required students to receive parental permission before changing their gender.

“The evidence and circumstances suggest that Mr. Burgess believed that, if he brought to light supposed widespread unaddressed bullying and harassment of LGBTQ students and convinced a federal agency to investigate such matters, the School Board would cave to the inevitable criticism and bad press—particularly if Mr. Burgess, aided by the press, could convince the public that the School District’s new policies were the actual cause of such bullying and harassment,” the report stated.

As a result of Burgess’ suspension, supporters of the teacher conducted “walk outs” for four days causing a “major disruption” to the middle school’s operations, the report showed. Central Bucks Board of School Directors Karen Smith alleged to the OCR that district engaged in “discrimination” and did not allow LGBTQ students who participated in the “walk outs” to reenter the building.

The investigation found that claims that the school discriminated against students who walked out in support of Burgess were “factually and legally baseless.”

Although the ACLU alleged that the district was ignoring reports of harassment and bullying, the investigation found in a review of more than 1,000 incidents reported to the district’s electronic database that 53 incidents were “sex-based offenses” such as sexual harassment, harassment and bullying, and that the administration responded to all 53.

“The ACLU’s attorney was recently quoted as saying about this district, ‘This is a school district that really does nothing to try to improve the really toxic environment for LGBTQ+ students,'” Lisa Sciscio, a Central Bucks school board member, said at the Thursday meeting where the report was revealed. “Would you say that’s what your investigation found?”

“That’s not what the evidence showed,” a Duane Morris attorney responded.

The OCR currently has four investigations open into the school district and the allegations reported by Burgess and the ACLU. The ACLU of Pennsylvania claims that the Duane Morris investigation was not credible because it has an “obvious bias against the trans and non-binary students who lodged the complaint” and the law group failed to interview faculty that are “most familiar with the problems.”

“ACLU-PA fully expects that the U.S. Dept of Education will conclude, after reviewing the evidence fairly and honestly, that CB [Central Bucks] is systematically and intentionally violating students’ civil rights,” the organization wrote in a tweet. “All students can and must be provided a safe and supportive environment.”

ACLU-PA and the Central Bucks school board did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.