At Tuesday night’s Springfield Public Schools board meeting, Katrina Trussler brought a Pride flag to the podium and planted it there during her three-minute public comment. One reason, Trussler said after the meeting, was to show members of the board there isn’t anything scary about it weeks after it was banned from classrooms at Kickapoo High School, the school her daughter once attended. Another reason, she said during her public comment, was to reinforce that it can help students in need find support.
“Do you know the second leading cause of death of Americans from 10 to 24 is suicide?” Trussler said. “And kids who identify with this flag are four times more likely to attempt that. But one supportive adult in their life reduces that risk by 40 percent. I’m asking the school board to allow teachers to save lives, to be that one adult, and to allow teachers to have this flag in their classroom, because it’s not a political statement. It’s a lifeline.”
Citing school board policy GBCB, which forbids staff from representing their personal opinions as the opinion of the district, Kickapoo High School’s principal told several teachers before the school year started to remove Pride flags from their classrooms.
Meeting followed recent Pride flag ruling, on-air scrutiny of gender issues by two board members
On Friday, board member Steve Makoski said he personally supported that decision while subbing in as a radio host on KWTO’s Elijah Haahr Show. The show was billed as centering around the idea of gender issues as an academic hindrance, with Makoski saying he was speaking as a citizen, not a board member. He invited on several guests, including board vice president Maryam Mohammadkhani, who shared similar views. Makoski, Mohammadkhani and Don Hinkle, a public policy advisor at the Missouri Baptist Convention, each expressed concern that designated Safe Spaces on campuses could lead vulnerable kids to be groomed by adults taking advantage of the situation, according to a Springfield News-Leader recap of the show.
The discussion on the show raised alarms among local and statewide LGBTQ+ advocacy groups, and representatives of several organizations joined Trussler Tuesday in calling for equitable treatment of LGBTQ+ students.
“I'm here to tell the board of education that you still have an opportunity to do what's right,” said Katy Erker-Lynch, executive director of PROMO, a St. Louis-based LGBTQ+ advocacy group. “You have the power to stop this before vulnerable students are bullied, shamed and forced to feel othered and left out because of the new interpretation of existing district policies. I'm really curious why in the past several weeks the district policy that has existed and [has] been on the books is now being interpreted so very differently.”
Rue Lohn, cooperative youth group and family connection director at The Connecting Grounds, cited Trevor Project surveys on LGBTQ+ mental health in both an email to the board and at the podium, including a stat that 42 percent of LGBTQ+ youth have seriously contemplated suicide and 23 percent have attempted it.
“The mental health of our LGBTQ+ students is directly impacted by the environments they occupy and the perceived level of safety within those environments,” Lohn wrote. “Consequently, the LGBTQ+ youth who had access to affirming spaces reported having a safe, affirming lower rates of suicidal ideation attempts.”
About 30 people write to board in support of LGBTQ+ rights, representation
Aaron Schekorra, president of Springfield’s PFLAG chapter, did not speak Tuesday, but he helped mobilize dozens to share their stories and views with the board. PLFAG developed a submission system for advocates to draft emails that would be sent to the school board. He said about 30 were submitted.
“As the mom of transgender children, I cannot stress enough how supportive parents just want our kids to be safe and happy,” Kit Creemer, a member of the PFLAG board, wrote in one of the submissions. “It is my wish that Springfield Public School Board Members Steve Makoski and Maryam Mohammadkhani spend time with a family of a transgender child. Shadow the student at school for a day and see what types of obstacles they face, how it feels for them to see a Safe Space sticker on a teacher’s door, and learn to view teachers who take a special interest not as ‘groomers’ but as caring human beings who want to keep all children alive and well.”
Board member: New policy interpretation that led to Pride flag prohibition ‘saddens me’
Board member Shurita Thomas-Tate said during the meeting’s board comments session that she was concerned about what she described as a new interpretation of the GBCB board policy.
“I'm not completely sure why now this new interpretation or the way that we're responding has changed, other than to think of it as being a direct response to political agendas,” Thomas-Tate said. “This move saddens me because I truly, truly believe that representation matters. We know that students who are seen and supported and heard and feel safe — they do perform better in school. And you can see Maslow's hierarchy about that. Not only that, particularly with this particular population, they live. And they live a better life because of that kind of representation. We are now being challenged in all sorts of spaces with banning books that have representation of students' identities, whether it's, you know, LGBTQIA+ or other identities, and I think our students are now questioning whether or not we are trying to ban them. Not just their identities, but what are we saying about our students when we ban books, and we ban symbols and things that represent their identities?”
Board member Scott Crise thanked Thomas-Tate for her comments while pointing out that books have not been banned at SPS.
“That may be done in other districts, but that’s not done in Springfield,” he said.
Thomas-Tate said it hasn’t happened here yet.
“I would agree that I hope it’s never done, but this kind of leads in that direction, and I just want to not see that happen also,” Thomas-Tate said.
Makoski did not speak during the board comment session. Mohammadkhani thanked the volunteer staff at the PTA Clothing Bank during her comments. Kelly Byrne said he believed “every member on this board cares deeply about all students, and I think it’s important to all of us in the district that all students are safe and given an opportunity for academic excellence.”
After the meeting, Thomas-Tate reiterated the importance of representation for a student’s personal and academic success.
“Representation matters,” Thomas-Tate said. “I mean, as a person of color, representation matters. I don't share the LGBTQIA+ identity. However, every child should be affirmed in our classrooms, in our schools. They should feel like they belong. They should feel like this is the place that they should be. And if they're not, how do you expect them to learn?”
