Y E S T E R D A Y

The showdown at San Leandro High
Part One
By Ira Eisenberg
A battle between parents and gay-rights advocates may be a preview of the country's next great culture war
(06/01/98)

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D R A M A++Q U E E N

What's the worst thing your mother ever did to you? Send your submission to theDrama Queen for a Day contest

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T A B L E++T A L K

Culture wars: How do you shelter your kids from the negative influences of popular culture? Join the discussion in Table Talk's Mothers area

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R E C E N T L Y

Infant Revolution
By Dawn MacKeen
The children who are giving Nike a dressing down
(05/29/98)

No turning back
By Sallie Tisdale
At what point do you need to tell your child he can't come home again?
(05/28/98)

My son, the cross-dresser
By Lisen Stromberg
Why are tomboys cute but "janegirls" weird?
(05/27/98)

Back to my future
By Lori Leibovich
Dancing cheek to cheek with your high school self
(05/26/98)

BROWSE THE MOTHERS WHO THINKARCHIVES

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Mamafesto
By Camille Peri
Why it's time
for Mothers Who Think

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CLASS WARFARE | PAGE 2 OF 3

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G/SA's persistent characterization of their religious, family-oriented critics as ignorant bigots deeply offended the dominant sensibilities of this community. "They're a bunch of snotty elitists who have contempt for working families and their values," says Parents Interested in Public Education member Jim Godkin. But the persistent accusations of bigotry caused potential supporters to avoid open association with PIPE. When the group held a public meeting at the town's main library early in December, the few sympathizers who showed up found themselves surrounded by a hostile crowd of G/SA faithful. And when the organization's leaders passed around a petition calling on school authorities to concentrate on academics and keep "lifestyle issues" out of the classroom, sparks began to fly. GS/A co-founder Terry Minton loudly denounced the petition as "intentionally ambiguous in order to hide your bigotry and hate-based agenda," and soon became embroiled in an exchange of insults with Dennis Price. Finally, an African-American teenager sitting quietly near the back of the auditorium rose to her feet.

"You guys are supposed to be the adults and we're supposed to be the children, and look how you're acting," scolded Le Jon Johnson, startling the two flushed white men into speechlessness. "What are you trying to teach us?" she demanded. When Minton attempted to silence her, Johnson cut him short. "You're going to have to suspend me to shut me up," the young woman shot back, jaw set and eyes blazing. "We didn't come here to point fingers at anybody," she continued, turning to Price, "but we've been called names and you've been called names, and to what purpose?"

There then followed the only civil exchange known to have taken place between the bitterly contending factions. "The community is really frustrated," Joanna Price told Terry Minton. "When parents' concerns are treated with contempt by teachers there's something radically wrong, and parents are coming to the point where they just won't take it anymore." Her voice was calm, and the group of students and teachers who accompanied Minton pressed forward to listen. "When people strongly disagree, a spirit of compromise is basically where you end up -- that's the American system," Price continued. "We need to find a way to agree to disagree, and part of finding that common ground is to listen to one another without making accusations. This conflict for conflict's sake is nothing but destructive, and in the end the majority will get what it wants anyway."

"But the majority can't just take the minority's rights away," Minton replied, his tone more beseeching now than pugnacious. "The lifestyle choice you're targeting is a gay one, and your words are intentionally misleading and dishonest. In your zeal to silence issues you personally, philosophically and religiously disagree with, you want to put constraints on my ability to deal with issues that relate to a kid's ability to learn and grow." An intense but respectful debate between the two continued for perhaps an hour, with neither party raising their voice, resorting to insults or giving ground. "This is the most opportunity I've had to actually discuss these issues with you," Dennis Price declared in frank amazement. It was an epiphany others in the room clearly shared.

In the end, however, Minton grew belligerent, accusing Joanna Price of trying to drive him out of San Leandro High and predicting dire consequences for gay students "if there aren't people like me around" to protect them. "But go ahead, have at me," Minton challenged. "I love persecution. I'm tough. I can take it."

After that encounter, two parallel battles raged unabated -- one in full view of the public and the other behind the scenes. G/SA partisans regularly appeared at school board meetings to demand that homosexuals, bisexuals and transsexuals be declared a protected minority and "diversity training" be implemented to sensitize teachers to the special needs of this "at-risk population." The parents of PIPE for the most part stayed away from these meetings. "We're not about to get into a hissing contest with those people," said Dennis Price. But they were intensely busy behind the scenes, hounding school board members with letters and telephone calls and filing official complaints.

Meanwhile, the drama involving the principal players moved toward a climax. After talking to her union representative and consulting with a private attorney regarding the laws of defamation, Joanna Price took the G/SA flyer accusing her of being part of an "anti-gay agenda" directly to district school superintendent, Tom Himmelberg. "I feel unsafe," she told him, and refused to return to the classroom until Minton and the G/SA quit vilifying her. "I want my good name back," she demanded. There followed a series of intense, often-heated "mediation" sessions in Himmelberg's office between Price, Minton and principal Leigh Akins. According to Price, they ended with Minton admitting he produced the offending flyer, and Akins penning a mea culpa apologizing to Price for the "personal attacks," admitting that she "should have addressed this earlier" and warning staff and faculty that such things "cannot happen again to Joanna or anyone else."

A stylish and sophisticated former physical education teacher with a nearly new Mercedes sports coupe bearing a personalized license plate that reads "CUTE," Akins was popular with the gaggle of fledgling teachers she hired this school year, but not highly regarded by many tenured faculty at San Leandro High. "I can't understand Leigh," confided one veteran social science instructor. "She's either incredibly stupid or has no control over her people. Our biggest problem is Terry Minton, and Leigh's letting him run the school."

"I sympathize with what they're trying to accomplish," one respected academic department head told me, referring to the G/SA. "But the essence of democracy is tolerance and compromise. The G/SA crowd fancy themselves revolutionaries, and revolutionaries are intolerant of anyone who disagrees with them."

"We can't continue this way much longer," observed an esteemed math teacher. "The school board can't allow Terry and the G/SA to continue disrupting the high school. I think we'll see some changes."

Absent a systematic poll, and judging from my own conversations with staff members at the high school last year, I am convinced that the views quoted above speak for a substantial number of San Leandro High's 80 teachers -- and probably most of those with experience and tenure. (That none of Akins' critics were willing to be identified should surprise no one familiar with the culture of public school teachers. Tenure provides slim protection against administrative retaliation, and for all their breast-beating about freedom of speech, teachers are notoriously reluctant to express opinions on controversial issues, let alone criticize their superiors.)

In fact, changes have come to pass at San Leandro High. The two lesbian students transferred out of San Leandro High, claiming harassment by fellow students. They plan to complete their high school education in an independent studies program administered by the district office. Superintendent Himmelberg, who conducted his own discreet investigation, concluded that the girls had in fact engaged in inappropriate "sexual behavior" at school and "should have been disciplined for it at the time."

Following a recent series of closed-door meetings with the superintendent regarding parental complains lodged against her, principal Leigh Akins resigned to become principal of Tamalpais High School, across the Bay in tony Mill Valley.

Minton has shaved his head, lowered his profile and, according to informed faculty, will not be returning to San Leandro High in September. Minton declined to confirm or deny the rumor.

The lesbian teacher who "came out" to her ninth grade science class has been on sick leave most of the year and reportedly is looking for another job. Several other of Akins' recent hires have not had their contracts renewed, and a few more have elected not to return.

The most contentious issue, however, involves GS/A co-founder Karl Debro. After investigating complaints by the parents of two of his students, Superintendent Himmelberg concluded that Debro had committed serious breaches of professional conduct, including failing to adhere to prescribed course curriculum, humiliating individual students in his class and denigrating their parents' religious and political beliefs, and misusing his authority as a teacher to promote ideologies and causes he personally favored. Himmelberg entered two lengthy letters of censure in Debro's personnel file.

On the evening of May 13, the trustees of the San Leandro USD convened to hear an appeal of those censures. Attorney Ballinger G. Kemp argued the case for Debro on behalf of the California Teachers Association. Stephen Wood, a lawyer with the church-supported Pacific Justice Institute, appeared on behalf of Jeff and Vicki Godkin and their son Jason, one of two PIPE families whose formal complaints led to Debro's censure. The new city hall council chamber was packed with some 150 partisans of both sides.

Debro sat conspicuously in the center of the first row, clutching his wife's hand and earnestly searching trustees' faces for clues to his fate. For the teacher and his family there was more at stake here than just one small setback for gay rights: A decision to uphold the superintendent's judgments could be the beginning of the end of Debro's 14-year career in the public schools.

N E X T+P A G E: A dramatic clash of philosophies