William Beye Elementary School, part of the Oak Part public-school system, recently drew criticism from the Illinois Family Institute ( IFI ) for hosting a series of seminars aimed at increasing teacher awareness of LGBT families.The seminars were presented by the Illinois Safe Schools Alliance's executive director Shannon Sullivan.
According to an interview Beye's principal, Jonathan Ellwanger, gave to the Chicago Sun-Times, the seminars came in response to the bullying of a student with same-sex parents.
Laurie Higgins, director of IFI's Division of School Advocacy, wrote in a January column, "It was only a matter of time before homosexual activism infected elementary education here in Illinois.
"The forms of diversity of which Ms. Sullivan is enamored are, in the view of many people, profoundly wrong; and public schools have no right to use school hours, school resources, and public money to affirm Ms. Sullivan's unproven, divisive theories to children," Higgins wrote.
In an interview, Higgins said that she objected to the teaching of "homosexuality" as "by nature analogous to race or skin color"which she called an "absurd proposition."
Ellwanger told Windy City Times that he "didn't see [ the controversy ] coming."
"The long and the short of it is that we've got caught up in some things bigger than us," Ellwanger said. "I don't think it had anything to do with us."
Though Higgins said that she had not contacted Beye directly with her concerns, they were apparently well-publicized enough to draw a large crowd to a January 19 PTO meeting, at which Sullivan presented.
At the end of a question-and-answer session, Sullivan said, a parent read a statement about the controversy that Sullivan called "pretty mean … a couple of students left the room crying."
Sullivan said that her organization had fielded a number of calls on the mattersome of which were supportive, she said, and some of which she characterized as "blithering idiot stuff." Many complained about the spending of taxpayer money on the seminarsalthough Sullivan pointed out that that money was the PTO's, and not public.
Sullivan said that she thought some parents' concerns about addressing LGBT issues in schools sprung from their recognition that young people tend to be more accepting of LGBT people.
"They understand that the next generation of people will be making policy decisions, which is why this work is so important," she said.