Sorry Charlie!

Well, a school district in Virginia has seen the light! That is, after a lawsuit.

King George School Board votes to permit non-curricular organizations at middle school level

Fredericksburg Free Press

By Adele Uphaus | Sep 11, 2026

The King George County School Board approved updates to its policy governing student organizations and a regulation governing non-curriculum-related student organizations following a closed session that began at 8 a.m. Friday.

The updated policy allows secondary school students to organize and conduct meetings of non-curriculum-related groups — a change to language the board adopted last November that restricted such groups to high school students only.

The updated regulation lays out the procedure for establishing a non-curriculum-related student organization. It requires “proof of written parental permission to form and/or join” the organization. If the organization wants to renew for a subsequent year, the renewal request form must include “a list of students who are currently members” and “proof of written parental permission from each member to renew such membership.”

So lets step back in time to...

A Virginia school board bent over backward to block an LGBTQ+ club. One mom explains why she’s suing

Susan Park says she filed a federal lawsuit after the King George County School Board repeatedly rewrote its rules to keep a gay-straight alliance from forming.

The Advocate

Christopher Wiggins

Aug 06, 2026

Susan Park’s child has already advanced from King George Middle School, about an hour and 20 minutes southeast of Washington, D.C. The eighth-grade year in which he hoped to join a gay-straight alliance, make friends and find some relief from bullying is over. That time cannot be returned to him. When school starts, he will enter King George High School.

Park could have allowed the dispute over the club to become another family’s problem. Instead, on Tuesday, she, along with the family of another student, filed a federal lawsuit so that the next LGBTQ+ student in this rural Virginia county might receive what her child was denied.

The school was happy with providing the club... but then parents and outsider got involved!

Some parents circulated the materials in a community Facebook group, generating hundreds of comments. The proposed faculty sponsor was allegedly doxxed, accused of “grooming” children and targeted with demands that she be fired.

The Fredericksburg Free Press went on to write;

“I’d [Board member Ed Frank] also like to state that every student in King George County Schools deserves to be safe, treated with dignity, and protected from bullying,” he said. “My concern is not about denying protection to any child. My concern is age appropriateness, parental transparency, and rules governing extracurricular discussions.”

[...]

Board member Colleen Hoover said “a lot of blood, sweat, and tears” went into conversations about the policy and regulation.

“The community as a whole needs to come out and be more supportive,” she said. “We were voted into this position to be here and do what you want us to do, and sometimes when things get difficult, it would be nice to have more community support.”

Gee how the Board changed its tune once the lawsuit was filed!

In another Advocate article they report;

“Having been advised that the parties have reached a settlement,” Senior U.S. District Judge Robert E. Payne wrote in a September 4 order obtained by The Advocate, “any further discovery deadlines are stayed until further order of this Court.”

[...]

The lawsuit accused the school board, Superintendent Jesse Boyd, and King George Middle School Principal Casey Nice of violating the First Amendment and the federal Equal Access Act by blocking the GSA while finding ways for other student organizations to continue operating.

The legal principle is well established. In Board of Education v. Mergens, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Equal Access Act, which requires federally funded public secondary schools that permit noncurricular clubs to provide other student groups equal access regardless of their message. Federal courts have repeatedly applied that protection to GSAs, including rulings for students in California and Kentucky. In 2016, a federal appeals court also ruled that the act covered a Florida middle school. Schools can close their forums to all noncurricular clubs, but once they allow even one, courts have said they cannot exclude an LGBTQ+ student group because officials or community members object to what it represents.

They added more hoops for the after school organizations to jump through...

Under a regulation adopted Friday, students must provide proof of written parental permission to form or join such an organization. Groups seeking to return in subsequent years must submit a membership list and proof that every student has parental permission to renew their participation.

So, because of their hatred of all things LGBTQ+, they added extra burdens for all the other clubs... which I imagine will not make them popular with the other clubs and students, and the LGBTQ+ students will be blamed for it.