Central Bucks bans Pride flags and other staff ‘advocacy’ amid federal investigation into treatment of LGBTQ students

The Central Bucks school board Tuesday voted to ban teachers from advocating political and “social policy” issues in schools, in its latest move spurring backlash from residents who accused it of imposing a partisan agenda on classrooms.

The Republican-majority board voted 6-3 to pass the ban, which will prohibit teachers from displaying Pride flags, despite a complaint by the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania and ensuing federal investigation into allegations the district has discriminated against LGBTQ students. A similar policy passed last year in the Pennridge School District, also in Bucks County.

The policy approved by Central Bucks on Tuesday doesn’t explicitly mention gender identity or sexual orientation; language specifying that teachers could not advocate beliefs on those topics was stripped upon the advice of former U.S. Attorney Bill McSwain and the Duane Morris law firm, which the district hired to represent it before federal investigators and conduct an internal review of the discrimination allegations.

But much of Tuesday’s discussion focused on Pride flags — which the district’s superintendent, Abram Lucabaugh, had previously likened to political symbols and which board president Dana Hunter said would be considered a prohibited “social policy” issue under the new ban. Students and family members of LGBTQ children said losing signs of inclusion would further marginalize an already vulnerable group.

Ashley Gane, whose sister, Katie Gane, was a Central Bucks West senior who died of suicide in 2019, said her sister was lesbian and had feared people judging her.

“A teacher putting a Pride flag in their room let her know she was supported,” Gane said. She said she previously asked the board whether its policy would require the removal of a rainbow memorial bench for her sister.

“You said, and I quote, ‘No, because it isn’t in a classroom setting,’” she said.

Kathleen Weintraub, a mother who works for the school district, said that “when you have a child come home from school saying that they don’t feel safe in their school ... it’s very stressful.”

“I need the board to understand that having a flag — which, let’s face it, that’s what this is about ... makes my child feel safe,” Weintraub said. Her child, CJ, a Central Bucks West senior, asked the board: “What will it take for you to listen to us, the queer and trans students that this policy directly affects?”

Others accused the board of disrespecting its teachers. Retired Central Bucks English teacher Katherine Semisch noted the policy’s stated aim of preventing classrooms from becoming “places of indoctrination,” which she called “an astonishing allegation against your own employees.”

Several parents thanked the board for the policy, including Leah Barnhart, who said that three years ago, her then-8-year-old son’s teacher talked with his class about using preferred pronouns.

“They took away my ability to parent my son on this non-curriculum-related topic,” she said.

The board’s action drew notice from state lawmakers, with the Pennsylvania LGBTQ+ Equality Caucus asking the district to withdraw the policy and calling it “another attempt to muzzle free expression, effectively ‘disappear’ members of our communities and silence the exchange of ideas that we should all want in our classrooms.”

The ACLU-PA in October filed a complaint against Central Bucks, describing incidents of bullying and district policies allegedly prejudiced against LGBTQ students that are now being investigated by the U.S. Department of Education.

Staff attorney Rich Ting said the new policy “just confirms that they’re disregarding and continuing to perpetuate the hostile environment for LGBTQ kids in the district,” while the Education Law Center said that it was “alarmed” that the district had adopted another policy “that will further dehumanize and discriminate against gay, transgender, and nonbinary students.”

The board last fall passed a policy that was also seen by critics as targeting LGBTQ students, prohibiting “sexualized content” in school libraries. The new directive was proposed as challenges to library books surged nationally, backed by conservative activists and often focused on books featuring LGBTQ characters and themes.

Debra Cannon, a member of the board majority elected in 2021′s contentious school board races, said Tuesday that she and fellow members had been unfairly maligned as extremists, rhetoric she said had filtered down to students.

The board is trying to ensure “age appropriateness,” Cannon said, voicing concern about “the disturbing amount of pedophilia in this country, as well as the obsession with immersing children in sexual content.”

And she said teachers weren’t all tolerant of opposing political viewpoints.

“For example: a teacher who expresses a personal rule in their classroom that they refuse to say the name of a former president, but instead will only refer to them as ‘No. 45,’” Cannon said. She also referred to a student suggesting during a class discussion a name of someone who had achieved the American dream, and another student responding, “That’s because they are a straight, white male and were able to do all of those things,” eliciting an “uproar of loud agreement.”

“That is allowing an open space to become a grossly one-sided perspective, where any dissenting views are targeted and chastised,” said Cannon, who said both examples took place in Central Bucks.

Critics questioned how teachers would navigate the new policy and expressed worry that self-censorship would stifle valuable classroom learning.

Ann Ferguson, a retired teacher, recalled a “wonderful discussion” she had while teaching a science class, spurred by a student who asked about stem cells.

“In Central Bucks, a teacher would feel a knot in their stomach about how to answer that question,” she said. “Do we reduce teachers to saying, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t answer that’?”

District administrators will now develop regulations for implementing the policy, said Kevin Shinkle of Devine & Partners, a public relations firm hired by the district last year. The process “could take several weeks and will involve teachers,” Shinkle said.

The district, which has drawn national media attention for the level of contention around its school board, also faced criticism Tuesday for the costs of the help it has hired. The district approved bills totaling $114,000 for Duane Morris, which the board voted Nov. 15 to hire in response to the ACLU complaint.

McSwain — who as a GOP candidate for governor last year referred to a West Chester school’s Gender Sexuality Alliance club as “leftist political indoctrination” — is charging the district $940 an hour, although he said he expected a second attorney, Michael Rinaldi, would bill more hours and charge a lesser rate of $640 an hour.

The firm’s $114,000 in costs were listed on a cash requirements report dated Dec. 12. Asked what period the charges covered, Shinkle said the district declined to comment.

In one of Tuesday’s more heated moments, Lori Ammon, whose children graduated from Central Bucks West in 2016 and 2018, including a son who is gay, told the board it was a “travesty that you had to hire a PR firm to spin your policies and a lawyer to defend civil rights abuses that you created.”

“Your days are numbered,” she said. “We didn’t see you coming before, but we do now. We didn’t think this could happen here, but it’s not going to happen next time we vote.”

“Are you threatening? Are you making a threat?” one board member said.

“I’m saying we’re not going to vote for you anymore,” Ammon said to applause. “Is that OK? Don’t we have a right to vote?”