The Nokomis Valley Middle School suspended an 8th grader for “bullying” after he mentioned a Title IX investigation against the school for allowing a trans-identifying male on the girls’ cheerleading team during a private conversation.
According to an incident report from the school, provided to The Maine Wire by the student’s guardian, the student simply made an innocuous reference to an ongoing federal investigation against the school district, and that was marked as bullying.
The incident took place on February 13, as students were approaching the gymnasium for a “Rock, Paper, Scissors” competition.
“Student A overheard someone behind them say something like ‘it’s sad that our district is being investigated because someone can decide their gender’ (this is not an eaxct quote but a paraphrase of the comment,) [sic]” said the report.
The suspended student, whom The Maine Wire is declining to name, was having a private conversation with a friend, according to his guardian, and was not directing the comments towards “Student A,” who merely overheard the statement.
The report shows that Student A reported the overheard conversation to Emelie Morton, the school’s guidance counselor, who then relayed the situation to Assistant Principal Susan Condon.
Condon then called the student out of an assembly to her office, where she admitted that she had made reference to the ongoing investigation, which is a matter of public record and is not confidential.
“Mrs. Condon told [student’s name] that he’s allowed to think/believe anything he wants but voicing those comments is different. He cannot make disparaging/discriminatory comments about others,” said the report.
Even in the report’s version of what took place, the comment overheard by Student A was merely a reference to the investigation, and seemingly could not reasonably be construed as discriminatory.
Nevertheless, school officials determined that the comment was a “major incident” and constituted bullying, with a suspected motive of obtaining peer attention.
He was ordered to serve in-school suspension from February 23 to 25. According to his guardian, he was out of school on those days due to vehicular troubles, and he was first approached to serve the suspension on Thursday when he returned to school.
“There’s a good chance he’s not coming to school for the next three days, because he’s not going to serve in school suspension for something that he didn’t do anything wrong, and that’s how we ended it. The school’s very smug,” said the student’s guardian.
Though the report is dated February 13, the document provided to the Maine Wire shows that it was generated on Thursday.
The statement came in reference to an ongoing federal investigation into the school district, RSU 19, which serves Corinna, Dixmont, Etna, Hartland, Newport, Palmyra, Plymouth, and St. Albans.
The investigation began in January and accused the district of allowing a male student to serve on the girls’ cheerleading team at Nokomis Valley Middle School.
