EXCLUSIVE | Seaford School District responds after student was attacked for being gay
After days of silence, the Seaford School District has officially issued a statement after a freshman at Seaford High School was attacked for being gay.
“The Seaford School District recognizes that safe learning environments are necessary for students to learn and achieve high academic standards,” district officials said. “The District strives to provide safe learning environments for all students and all employees. The District has policies and procedures to address all forms of bullying in its schools.”
The Seaford School District issued the statement Thursday to WGMD following days of condemnation from the community over the handling of the situation.
The statement issued by the district did not directly address the issue of homophobic bullying involving the student, citing “privacy rights.”
“The District will continue to protect the right to privacy for all of its students,” the district explained. “As such, any cases involving individual students will not be discussed publically.”
WGMD News reached out to the Seaford School District on Monday after Cherae Fraizer, of Seaford, said her freshman son, Lamont Cloud Jr., had been attacked, harrassed, and bullied on a daily basis because he was gay, read more.
After news broke of the incident on Tuesday morning, CAMP Rehoboth, a nonprofit community service and advocacy group for LGBTQ youth in Sussex County, reached out to district and also received no response, read more.
“We’re extremely disappointed that they haven’t responded,” said Sal Seeley, CAMP Rehoboth’s director of health & wellness programs. “We’ve placed calls, emails, and we haven’t heard back either. It’s really disheartening.”
Seeley feels the Seaford School District is not safe for LGBTQ students in the face of a history of incidents involving homophobic bullying and anti-LGBTQ actions from teachers and administration.
“I don’t believe it’s safe for LGBTQ students,” he explained. “I think there’s other students who have harrassed other students. There’s also admin, teachers, who are not supportive of the LGBTQ community and I know that they’ve made it hard for them. We get those calls in at CAMP Rehoboth, and we’re usually the last place for these parents to go because they have no where else to turn.”
