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School board

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tigation. The School Board members listed as having access to the group were Denise Corbo (At-Large), Atoosa Reaser (Algonkian), Ian Serotkin (Blue Ridge), Leslee King (Broad Run), Beth Barts (Leesburg), and Brenda Sheridan (Sterling).

In March 2020, a mailer was sent out to families, stating that the school division “has recently teamed up with an extremist organization to teach your children to hate you.” The mailers are only signed “Concerned Parents of Loudoun County.”

Jamie Neidig-Wheaton, the group’s founder, said the Facebook group formed as parents worked to determine who was behind the mailers.

“They clearly had lists with our names and home addresses and were sending postcards,” Neidig-Wheaton said.

The “extremist organization” is The Equity Collaborative, which the district contracted to assess racial inequity in its hiring practices, teaching of students, and social impact after the Virginia Attorney General’s Office opened an investigation into racial discrimination. Both found evidence of systemic racism. However, some of the steps taken to address those concerns—including heightened staff training on racial and cultural competency—gave rise to a new set of criticisms from parents and national conservative media claiming students were being indoctrinated with progressive ideology rooted in Critical Race Theory.

The Facebook group members identified and discussed parents throughout the county who were vocal opponents to the school division’s equity work. Group members also discussed the merits of continuing distance learning throughout the pandemic, while many community members criticized the district’s handling of reopening schools.

Critics objected to elected officials discussing matters in a private group. The six board members have been targeted in a recall effort led by the group Fight for Schools.

Fight for Schools found that School Board members belong to multiple private Facebook groups, and alleged they violated open meeting laws by participating in the closed forums.

“What you see here is a pattern and practice of the LCPS of operating without transparency, without accountability, and they keep getting caught,” Ian Prior, executive director of Fight for Schools, said.

The latest update from Fight for Schools, from three weeks ago, showed that the petition to remove Beth Barts had 93 percent of the signatures needed to file the petition in court.

While there is little precedent for the removal of a School Board member via the state’s recall statute, Prior, a former Trump Department of Justice spokesman, said “there is as strong a case as any you will see in Virginia to remove Beth Barts.”

A Sheriff’s Office statement on the investigation said that complainants “believed that ARPLC’s posts were evidence of organized criminal activity intended to infringe upon First Amendment rights, and violated certain laws surrounding the crimes of stalking, harassment, and racketeering.”

In the group, some members discussed “hacking” to identify possible opponents of the equity work, although the investigation found no illegal evidence of hacking.

Barts told detectives she “went on the site and asked for advocacy to share that LCPS is not supporting critical race theory.”

While the investigation ended with no charges, Neidig-Wheaton moved her family from Loudoun County to the West Coast after the threats and harassment over her involvement became unbearable.

While Neidig-Wheaton does not appear to have been involved in the threads identifying parents, she is being sued by The Virginia Project for discussing the PAC within the Facebook group. TVP also published a tweet containing Neidig-Wheaton’s home address.

“It’s destroyed my faith in people who claim to love their neighbors,” Neidig-Wheaton said of the fallout surrounding the group. “I spent months having to worry about my children’s safety, while listening to people whose home addresses were never disclosed support the people who publicly tweeted mine.”

Reaser, the School Board’s vice chairwoman, said she also has been the recipient of hate messages for her involvement in the group. She shared publicly one message suggesting that she be “hanged by the neck until dead by the righteously angry parents of your community.” ”We’re pretty disappointed that the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office decided not to charge anybody. We certainly have more than adequate reason to believe that they could have and should have,” David Gordon, director of the Virginia Project, said.

The Sheriff’s Office told people who brought forward concerns about the group that they may still pursue misdemeanor charges and civil grievances against group members.

“We plan to pursue anything and everything allowed under the law,” Gordon said.

Transgender Protections

The biggest item on the School Board’s agenda on Tuesday will be the vote on Policy 8040, which provides protections for transgender and gender expansive students, complying with a Virginia mandate that school boards implement such safeguards by the start of the 2021-2022 school year.

Under the policy, transgender students will be entitled to be addressed by their chosen names and pronouns, and to use the bathroom and locker room that correspond with their gender identity.

Controversy surrounding the policy was punctuated when a Leesburg Elementary School teacher was placed on paid administrative leave after telling the School Board he would not observe the policy during a public comment session.

Byron “Tanner” Cross, represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, sued the district for his reinstatement. A circuit court judge awarded him his reinstatement, arguing that the district violated the teacher’s First Amendment rights. In an appeal, the School Board argued that the ruling erroneously overlooked the district’s responsibility to provide students with a safe learning environment. A hearing is set for Sept. 7 and 8 in circuit court, but a date for the state Supreme Court trial has not been set.

The Aug. 10 meeting is the final chance the School Board has to adopt the policy before the school year starts. If it fails to do so, the district assumes all liability relating to treatment of transgender students in the system.

Grading Changes

The Board will vote on updates to the district’s grading policy, with the proposed changes mostly applied to homework assignments. Under the proposed changes, homework will be used as more of a learning tool, as opposed to a graded assessment.

In a committee meeting reviewing the policy, Assistant Superintendent of Instruction Ashley Ellis analyzed focus group feedback from parents and educators.

“Focus group feedback is that homework is practice, and an opportunity for application, and should not be graded,” Ellis said.

The policy differentiates homework assignments from “summative assessments,” such as research papers and projects, which may also take place outside of the classroom. Summative assessments may not count for more than 10 percent of a quarter grade under the revised policy. The updated provisions also will not permit a single assignment to count for more than 25 percent of a quarter grade.

Dress Code to be Discussed

While an updated dress code will not be voted on during the Aug. 10 meeting, board members will discuss proposed changes to the current guidelines for student attire. The changes include banning hoods overheads during class, pajama tops, midriff bearing tops, and tube tops. According to Douglas Fulton, director of School Administration, Policy 8270, Student Dress Code, spurred more input than any other issue since the division’s new public feedback procedure was implemented.

“My philosophy is that we should limiting student’s freedom of expression to the least extent possible,” said board member Ian Serotkin (Blue Ridge). n

Land shortage

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seeing as well.

The key for the council, he said, is protecting the available commercial land it has left. Seymour said he was troubled by the amount of commercial land that is being rezoned to accommodate residential development.

“From an economic development standpoint, I have to fight tooth and nail for every piece of commercial space we have left, and it concerns me when I see it flipping because it’s a pattern being repeated over and over,” he said.

Seymour said the piece that’s missing from the town is employment.

“I don’t think we have to go after retail. Retail’s here, it follows the money,” he said. “We need to generate employment opportunities. If you find a way to do that you’re going to benefit retail across the board more than simply building houses.”

The way the council can address that problem, he said, is by avoiding residential re-zonings.

“Developers’ primary focus is going to be residential first, retail second. Don’t try to change back to residential anything that’s been zoned already commercial. But I would make sure that as development projects come in that the Town Council take a long, serious look at what’s needed, not that it has to be rezoned because it’s the best option for the development community,” Seymour said.

The problem, he said, isn’t interest from developers.

“Leesburg doesn’t have problem getting developers in. We do have a problem of space and we have a limited amount left,” he said. n