Farmington — With the new school year set to begin in Farmington on Aug. 29, Irving A. Robbins Middle School rising eighth graders Miles* and Quentin* are cautiously optimistic.
According to Miles, who identifies as nonbinary, and Quentin, who identifies as transgender, their seventh grade years were fraught with bullying from fellow students and the feeling that school administrators didn’t do enough to protect them and their LGBTQ peers.
They say the harassment and bullying they experienced ran the gamut from microaggressions such as whisper campaigns and stares in class, to being deadnamed and called homophobic slurs, to being urged to commit suicide, to allegedly being assaulted at the end of the school year when a student attempted to pull off a Pride flag that was tied around Miles’ neck.
“Every day in seventh grade I felt unsafe walking into school, walking into every single class, walking to my locker, walking to the bathroom, walking anywhere in the school,” Miles said.
Miles’s and Quentin’s experiences weren’t outliers, according to other Irving A. Robbins Middle School LGBTQ students and their parents. The students and parents said the Farmington School District did not do enough to protect them from frequent harassment, whichculminated in the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) opening an investigation following a 19,000-word, 54-page complaint filed by Miles’s mother, Melissa Combs.
In the complaint, Combs alleged that the school district engaged in “a pattern of discriminatory actions related to the Gender Sexuality Alliance Clubs at … IAR … and to their gender/sexual identity.”
In a statement sent to The Courant on Saturday night, Irving A. Robbins Middle School Principal Nilda Irizarry said, “While the district has a different perspective on the factual allegations, we respect the process and will be working with OCR to assist them in their review of these issues.”
The OCR’s investigation, believed to be the first of its kind in New England, focuses on seven of the 10 allegations in the complaint.
Farmington Superintendent of Schools Kathy Greider released a statement saying, “The district has received an inquiry from OCR and will be working with them to assist them in response to their inquiry.”
Both Greider and Irizarry also pointed to district policies and work in regard to equity and inclusion. Farmington does not have a transgender/nonbinary policy for its students.
“Please know we take issues related to student civil rights seriously as evidenced by the substantial equity and inclusion initiatives occurring across all schools in furtherance of our commitment to our diverse student body,” Irizarry said in the statement.
The OCR said the opening of an investigation does not imply wrongdoing by the district, but, in an email on Aug. 10, said it was honing in on allegations that the school district did not appropriately respond to several incidents of gender identity or sexual orientation harassment, as well as deadnaming, that were reported in February, March, May and June.
For students and parents, they said the issues run deeper than what the OCR is investigating. Some said it’s a matter of life and death.
Miles didn’t make a big show of coming out as nonbinary last year, but they wanted to be their authentic self. Now they have mixed emotions on whether it was worth it.
“I was getting tired of hiding who I was. … I didn’t want to hide anymore,” they said. “I wanted to meet new people. I’m thankful I came out. I met some amazing people this school year. But then sometimes I regret coming out ever, because I probably wouldn’t have gotten bullied, like if I never came out. I’m glad I can be who I am now — even…