A star student at a Maryland high school is being denied graduation next month due to what her family says is religious discrimination.
The student, whom Fox News Digital is calling “Jane” to protect her privacy, is a senior in Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS), who excels academically and is actively involved in her school. According to her parents and academic records, she is a leader in multiple extracurricular activities at her school, holds a 4.76 weighted GPA and received a 1450 (96th percentile) on her SATs.
However, she cannot graduate without completing a mandatory health course, which her parents say has “LGBTQ+ affirming” and “religiously discriminatory” content they find objectionable due to their deeply held Christian faith.
Jane’s family told Fox News Digital that they have been fighting for over two years for their daughter to be granted an opt-out from the course or be allowed to take an alternative class at a private school or do independent study under a teacher of their choosing to meet this requirement, to no avail.
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“She’s pretty distraught about not being able to graduate with all her friends and experience that rite of passage,” her father said.
With time running out before Jane’s senior year is complete, the parents have filed a petition to the Maryland Supreme Court asking them to review their case against the Montgomery County Board of Education (MCBE).
In August 2022, the parents learned that Jane was enrolled in a health class for her upcoming sophomore year which was required for graduation. They became aware that LGBTQ content would be incorporated throughout the year-long course, rather than limited to the Family Life and Human Sexuality unit of the course, as it had been previously.
Screenshots of alleged teacher training documents obtained by the parents and shared with Fox News Digital ask teachers to “review LGBTQ+ resources to incorporate more inclusive language” throughout the entire course.
The teacher guide also allegedly provides teachers with a list of “privileged” and “oppressed” people groups, in which it names “Christians” as privileged and “Non Abrahamic Religions/Spiritualities” as oppressed. A lesson invites teachers to have students identify people groups impacted by health inequities, such as “trans or gender-expansive,” LGBTQ+, and “people who identify with non-Christian faiths.”
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Another document they received called “worship of the written word” asks teachers to recognize “White supremacy culture” in the classroom and at home.
Their petition before the Maryland Supreme Court states that they withdrew their daughter from the upcoming class while seeking more information about the curriculum. They claim MCPS has refused their requests to view the lesson plans or opt their daughter out of the class.
The parents suggested Jane take the health class at a local, accredited Catholic high school or through independent study supervised by a former teacher in the MCPS system with a health education background.
MCPS rejected these suggestions, saying that Jane must be taught by a current MCPS teacher or fulfill the requirement through dual enrollment in a community college course, which her parents said was not an option because it conflicted with her high school class schedule, and it still would not have provided her protection as a minor from the curriculum they are objecting to.
After the school board denied their request, the parents appealed this administrative decision to the Circuit Court of Montgomery County in August 2024. In December, the court upheld the school board’s decision and the parents filed an appeal notice to the Appellate Court in January.
Because of the time-sensitive nature of their request, they have petitioned for a writ of certiorari to the Maryland Supreme Court while the matter remains pending before the Appellate Court.
The parents argue that MCPS was wrong to put LGBTQ+ affirming content throughout the entire health course, because this instruction was “restricted by law to the Family Life and Human Sexuality (“FLHS”) unit of the Health class, with parents having a regulatory right to opt out their child from that unit.”
“We are not trying to get MCPS to stop teaching about LGBTQ+ or change its curriculum,” the parents wrote in a letter dated March 7, 2024, to the Maryland State Board of Education. “We are trying to get MCPS to keep that teaching restricted to the Family Life and Human Sexuality part of the curriculum so we can get notice of it and opt-out our daughter, or if MCPS is allowed to spread LGBTQ+ instruction throughout the entire health class, as its teacher instruction materials say it is doing, it follows that MCPS should allow us to opt-out our daughter from the entire class. We are trying to get MCPS to refrain from discriminating against religion.”
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They’ve chosen not to transfer their daughter out of the district in order to fight for the rights of all religious students in the district who are being compelled to take this class to graduate and whose families cannot afford the costs, transportation and time to attend private or home school.
The parents filed a separate but related complaint against the school in March over their requests for class documents. Their complaint accuses the school board and MCPS of “knowingly and willfully” withholding public information from them in violation of the Maryland Public Information Act.
The Montgomery County Board of Education and Montgomery County Public Schools declined to comment on the pending litigation. The Maryland State Board of Education did not respond to a request for comment.
Montgomery County Public Schools is currently involved in another high-profile religious liberty case before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The case surrounds the school board removing its “opt-out” for parents challenging LGBTQ story books in the classroom.
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A coalition of Jewish, Christian and Muslim parents of school-age children have brought a lawsuit against the school board, alleging it is violating their religious freedoms protected under the First Amendment, by forcing their young children to participate in instruction contrary to their religious beliefs.
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Tuesday in the case that could set a precedent for parents’ rights in schools across the nation. The high court’s conservative majority offered strong support to parents presenting the religious liberty case.