When I posted my story about the May 8th HSE School Board meeting, I addressed what happened, what surrounded the session and credited two school boar members, Mike Bottorff and Brad Boyer, for having the courage to change their votes.

But there are three ladies that need to be singled out as the ones spearheading the move toward a nondiscrimination policy the community could support.  Those three are school board members Michelle Fullhart, Julie Chambers and Janet Pritchett.

Fullhart is beginning her second term, or fifth year, on the HSE School Board.  She has been a consistent proponent of a nondiscrimination policy with a comprehensive list of those to be protected by that policy.

Chambers, a newly-elected board member, spoke-out at the February 13th board meeting when the nondiscrimination policy was before the board, and tied the issue into the city and school system’s efforts at improving mental health.  “How dare we say we are forward thinking,” Chambers said at that time.

Janet Pritchett, another newly-elected member of the board, has supported providing a list of those covered by the policy, including gender orientation and gender identity.

These three ladies never gave up on their mission to strengthen the school district’s policy on nondiscrimination.  Even though they were outvoted at the April 24th board meeting on this policy question, the three eventually persuaded two other board members to join them at the May 8th meeting when final approval was before the board.

Another person that should be recognized is Jennifer Chavez, a resident that spoke before the board February 13th and argued for students and staff members not be subjected to discrimination due to gender identity.

As I have written previously, as difficult as this was for the board members to handle, a nondiscrimination policy is only as good as its implementation.  Let’s hope members of the HSE Schools community come together to make this policy work.