Parents sue son's 'intolerant' school for suspending him 'over his conservative views' after he called transgender people sociopaths and said legalizing gay marriage was a 'slippery slope'

The parents of a teenage boy have threatened to sue his Connecticut school for suspending him to leave after he called transgender people sociopaths and said legalizing gay marriage was  a 'slippery slope'.

Michael Mancini, a high school sophomore, was asked to leave the $62,000-a-year Cheshire Academy after sharing his views with classmates and staff earlier this year.

His class had been discussing the Shakespeare play The Twelfth Night at the fact that one of the female characters dresses as a male.

As the class spoke about it being an attempt by Shakespeare to put a 'positive light on transgenderism', Michael interjected 'that during the time the book was written (1601-1602) his society would never partake in that sociopathic act,' his father, Theodore Mancini, wrote on a website listing his complaints.

He went on to compare transgender people to serial killers, specifically Ted Bundy, his father wrote.

'For his example he used Ted Bundy and his normalization of his bloodlust... Ted Bundy attempted to normalize his lust for killing, just as members of society today are trying to normalize transgenderism,' he said.

The teenager added: 'If a man thinks he is a woman or a woman a man, it shows legitimate hormonal or mental disorder. Although those that identify as things such as Demi-Queer Fox-Kin are just looking for attention.'

Afterwards, he was talking to a teacher in the hallway who asked him for his opinion on gay marriage.

He replied by saying 'he is fine with homosexuals being legally married but is opposed to any church or religious organization performing the ceremonies since it goes against their teachings or dogma,' his father wrote.

He added that 'whenever you seek to change the norms of a society, you have to be very careful to guard against it becoming a "slippery slope"'.

To prove his point, he went on: 'Pedophiles now call themselves MAPS or minor attracted persons and they are using the same steps that gays used in the 70’s-90’s to become normalized.

'Another example… in Canada, their Supreme Court has already declared most forms of bestiality legal…'

In a third incident, the boy, who is white, joked during a thinking workshop when asked to say something about himself that was obvious that he was black.

The school held a disciplinary hearing where they accused him of harassment and harming an individual.

Afterwards, he was told he could voluntarily leave the school with a clean record or be suspended five days and have the incidents put in his file.

His parents say that the school breached its contract with him and that he is being unfairly punished for his views.

They have threatened to file a lawsuit against the school which they say will seek damages for the emotional distress they say he has endured.

James Sullivan, the family's attorney, provided the school with a notice of the lawsuit last week.

It has not yet been filed.

He told The New Haven Register: 'It belies the whole concept of liberalism, which is to embrace diverse ideas. In this politically correct environment, they are being very intolerant.'

The school has not commented publicly on the issue but said in an email to parents 'This student was given a number of chances to adhere to our expectations and the rules and code of conduct of Cheshire Academy.

'Contrary to what you may have read, our decision was not based on an opposition to political dialogue.

'We will take steps to defend the good name and reputation of CA, and will continue to work with legal counsel through this unfortunate episode.'

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High school student expelled for kneeing boy who was protesting transgender student's bathroom use

A female student was reportedly expelled from her Alaska high school for kneeing a male classmate in the groin. The boy was allegedly among a group of male students who entered the women's restroom in protest over a transgender student using the men’s restroom.

The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reports a group of seven boys went into the women’s restroom at North Pole High School and blocked the door to protest a student who is transitioning from female to male and used the men’s restroom.

Though initial reports said the student was suspended from school after kneeing the boy, her family said she was expelled, according to the Washington Post. Her family told The Post they would be appealing the expulsion.

A district spokesperson told the Daily News-Miner that the seven boys involved were also disciplined. None of the students have been named due to district policy.

“Disciplinary actions are based on the facts as determined by the investigation, including any aggravating or mitigating circumstances,” the district said in a statement Monday to the local news outlet.

The Hill has reached out to the Fairbanks School District for additional comment.

The school district issued a lengthy statement on the incident Monday, addressing transgender students' use of restrooms.

"In regards to transgender students, when a student identifies as transgender in our district, the student (and often the family) work with school counselors and administration to determine how to best meet that student’s educational needs,” the statement read. “The conversation includes use of restrooms.”

The incident also drew the attention of Alaska state Rep. Tammie Wilson (R), who described the incident to the local newspaper and said she told the female student “good for her.”

“I would have taught my daughter to do the same,” Wilson said, adding that she doesn’t agree with the school district's decision to discipline the student.

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Australia still needs national education statistics

When Julia Gillard defied the odds in 2008 to introduce NAPLAN successfully, it may have been the most significant achievement by an Australian federal education minister in decades.

Australia finally had an objective, standardised measure of student achievement in the vital areas of literacy and numeracy, which could be used to track progress over time from the national level all the way down to individual children.

You wouldn’t know it from the chorus of NAPLAN naysayers, but the 2018 report released this week shows that results have improved significantly in some areas since the tests were introduced, such as in Years 3 and 5 reading. We want more consistent improvement in results across subjects, but there are a few good signs.

Nevertheless, some stakeholders and education unions want NAPLAN scrapped. But in response to student results that should be better, both sides of politics must resist the easy option of simply stopping the measurement of results.

More than $50 billion of taxpayer money is currently spent each year on schools. And in election news that won’t surprise anybody, the Coalition promises a substantial school spending increase, while Labor promises an even larger one.

But pork-barrelling aside, at the very least, both major parties should guarantee that basic accountability and transparency for school NAPLAN results will be kept, as an indicator of the return on additional taxpayer investments.

And recent opinion polls indicate the public is generally supportive of NAPLAN and the national focus on literacy and numeracy. The clear majority of parents support NAPLAN and the MySchool website, and 75% of Australians think schools should prioritise maths and english.

Furthermore, many principals and teachers find NAPLAN data useful. When I interviewed principals for research on high-achieving disadvantaged schools, they were generally positive about NAPLAN and find the data useful to track student progress.

If we want to help disadvantaged students thrive at school, then we need to have an objective benchmark against which their progress can be measured, so that we can identify the most effective and efficient ways of assisting them.

It’s not just taxpayers who will be let down if NAPLAN is abandoned; it’s students too.

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