United States District Court.  In 2003, the ACLU of Kentucky, together with the national ACLU’s Lesbian and Gay Rights Project, represented the Boyd County High School Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA), seven student members, their parents, and their faculty advisor in a lawsuit challenging the school system’s refusal to allow the GSA to meet. The suit also challenged the school’s failure to provide a safe educational environment for students who either are, or are perceived to be, lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered (LGBT). After winning a preliminary injunction vindicating the right of the GSA to meet, a Consent Decree was entered into with the Board of Education of Boyd County, which, among other things, requires the Board to conduct mandatory anti-harassment training for all middle and high school students, faculty, and staff.

In response to the Consent Decree, the Boyd County middle and high schools conducted anti-harassment trainings during the 2004-2005 school year. Notwithstanding the fact that the trainings were supposed to be “mandatory,” the Board allowed hundreds of students to “opt-out” of attending and leveled only minor consequences, i.e. a mere unexcused absence. Similarly, it appears that staff who missed the mandatory training were only docked a day’s pay. In addition, the student trainings and possibly the staff trainings failed to include the focus on sexual orientation or gender identity harassment that the Consent Decree explicitly required.

Consequently, the ACLU of Kentucky and the national ACLU’s Lesbian and Gay Rights Project have returned to court to ensure that the Board lives up to its obligations under the Consent Decree.