CMS Grows Anti-Bullying List
With little debate and virtually no fireworks, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education on Tuesday night approved some technical amendments to its existing anti-bullying policy that sparked community uproar when it was originally adopted in 2008.
CMS already had rules on the book that prohibited bullying when it codified its stand as formal policy two years ago. In addition to expanding the scope of anti-bullying rules to include CMS staff, as well as students, and directing the superintendent to implement anti-bullying training programs, the policy also included specific traits or characteristics that would be protected from bullying or harassment. The inclusion of sexual orientation and gender identity/expression triggered a firestorm of controversy.
Critics of the policy contended it had as much to do with trying to indoctrinate students to accept alternative sexual behaviors as normal and appropriate, as it did with protecting all students from bullying.
If the largest school district in the state adopted such language, the argument went, it would pave the way for the state legislature to do likewise. Legislators, along with the state board of education, had previously balked at including specific classifications for protection from bullying.
“The school board should be more concerned with enforcing existing rules and statewide policies against bullying and harassment,” John Rustin, of the NC Family Policy Council, said at the time, “than with fighting to include specific language that gives the homosexual agenda a foothold in policy.”
After CMS’ policy was adopted, the N.C. General Assembly followed suite, approving the School Violence Prevention Act last summer. The legislation not only included the controversial classifications of sexual orientation and gender identity, but a whole slew of others; so many, in fact, that CMS had to tweak its own anti-bully policy to keep pace.
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