No fight over sex education, Montgomery County school board candidate promises
Schaerr says she won't raise the issue of homosexual education despite past legal action
A Montgomery County Board of Education candidate has vowed that she won't revive a past legal tussle with county schools over the sex education curriculum.
Martha Schaerr, who is running to represent District 5 on the school board against incumbent member Michael A. Durso, downplayed her involvement with a group that in 2007 tried to stop two lessons dealing with homosexuality from being taught in Montgomery County Public Schools sex education classes.
Schaerr, a Derwood resident, said her involvement with the Family Leader Network against the classes in eighth and 10th grade won't matter if she wins the Nov. 2 election. The other board members won't support efforts to change the curriculum, Schaerr said, making any action on her part pointless.
"Why would I go back to things where I know nobody's going to agree with me?" said Schaerr, a Derwood resident, who acknowledged that stressing the issue would hurt her candidacy.
But Schaerr is a "stealth" candidate who is deliberately hiding anti-homosexual views that she knows to be unpopular in the county, said David Fishback, an Olney resident who helped the school system write the sex education curriculum in the past.
"She should have the courage to talk about it," said Fishback, who is chairman of the Metro DC Chapter of Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays. "But she's trying to avoid it. She's trying to basically get on the school board without people knowing."
Previously, the conservative Christian Coalition has been accused of backing "stealth" candidates in local elections, such as the San Diego school board race in 1990. Schaerr denies she is such a candidate.
Schaerr is on the board of directors of the Fairfax, Va.-based Family Leader Network, an organization that supports abstinence education, traditional marriage and "decency in broadcasting." She held the same volunteer position when it partnered with Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum (CRC) and Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays (PFOX) to stop portions of the sex education curriculum.
In one appeal from the three groups in 2007, Maryland state schools Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick rejected their complaint and allowed the school system to pilot the curriculum. In a separate appeal the same year, the Maryland Board of Education also ruled against the groups and approved the curriculum's implementation for the following school year.
The three groups then filed a lawsuit in Montgomery County Circuit Court in September 2007 to try to stop the portions of the curriculum that discussed homosexuality. The following January, Circuit Court Judge William J. Rowan dismissed the case.
Following a lawsuit by CRC and PFOX, which Schaerr said she supported, a previous school system pilot curriculum dealing with homosexuality was stopped by a federal judge in May 2005 because of evidence that the material singled out certain religions for their views on homosexuality. Fishback was chairman of the panel that developed the pilot curriculum.
In the "Issues" section of her campaign website, Schaerr does raise the issue of the sexual education, stating, "Give students full information about the health risks of any sexual practice discussed in the curriculum." There are also links to letters she wrote to The Gazette in 2007 discussing the sex education curriculum. In one letter, she criticized the curriculum for equating all negative attitudes about homosexuality to homophobia.
Fishback said that, regardless of Schaerr's positions on other issues, her most noteworthy public involvement in the schools has been the legal action against the sex education curriculum. Schaerr previously has served as president of the PTSA at Col. Zadok Magruder High School in Rockville.
"If this were the only issue that I cared about I would have run two years ago, but I didn't," Schaerr said.
The school issues that are more important to her include financial transparency, classroom management support for teachers and more help for parents seeking to guide their child's academic career, Schaerr said.
"There are many parents who feel shut out of the decision-making process at MCPS," Schaerr said. "Lawsuits are common because of that."
Jane deWinter, president of the Montgomery County Council of Parent-Teacher Associations from 2006 to 2008, said she did not recall Schaerr being publicly active in the legal complaints, although she noted that her organization did not involve itself in the process.
The fact that the groups took action because of strong personal beliefs merits attention, even if lawsuits against the school are common, she said.
"I think that when people are voting for anyone for any office, they need to look at the totality of what they believe in," deWinter said.
Durso agreed with Schaerr that sex education is not a "hot topic" on the school board. During his tenure as principal of Silver Spring's Springbrook High School, Durso recalled, there was a group of straight and gay students that met as an after-school club to discuss relevant issues.
"I think what's interesting is that over the years in my experiences, students have probably been far more tolerant of some of these issues than their parents and other adults," Durso said.
aujifusa@gazette.net
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