Carroll ISD will not negotiate over civil rights complaints with the Department of Education.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights opened three investigations in 2021 into allegations of discrimination in Carroll ISD.
The Office of Civil Rights this past May announced that four student complaints of discrimination regarding race and sexual orientation would be upheld after an investigation. The office then invited the Carroll ISD to negotiate a resolution, giving them 90 days to reach a deal before the agency could bring the issue to court, reported WFAA.
Carroll ISD board members this past Monday said that they have cooperated with OCR and insisted they will defend themselves from “baseless allegations.”
“The Board of Trustees and Administration thoroughly and fully cooperated with the Office of Civil Rights as soon as we became aware of the complaints and allegations. We answered every question the OCR investigators had and provided thousands of pages of documents in response to OCR inquiries,” the board’s statement read.
“The facts of each case that follow show why there was no ‘hostile educational environment’ and why, even if there were, CISD was not deliberately indifferent to it. They also show why CISD must defend itself against these baseless allegations,” the board’s statement read.
“We are simply not willing to put Carroll ISD into a burdensome agreement and knowing that OCR continues to refuse our requests for its factual findings. We have shown nothing but good faith in this process and expect the same from the OCR. For that reason, we declared an impasse in the negotiations and look forward to defending the District at all levels of this process,” the board statement concluded.
Carroll ISD board president this past Monday said that the board “concluded that our district has complied with the law in each case,” reported WFAA.
“OCR demands that if there is no action by the school district in the 90-day period to respond, that we must declare an impasse. Declaring an impasse seems entirely counterintuitive and counterproductive to the resolution process. Nevertheless, Carroll ISD has no other choice given the factors above. If OCR is not willing to provide the Board of Trustees with the information it needs to negotiate a Resolution Agreement, the District will await OCR’s Letter of Impending Enforcement Action so that it has the information needed to move forward with fair and transparent negotiations,” Carroll ISD board president Cameron Bryan said in a statement to DX.
The Department of Education did not immediately respond to a request for comment.