Last week (Nov. 18), the Justice Department
announced an extensive agreement between federal authorities and the DeKalb County, Georgia school district requiring the district to implement polices and procedures to prevent and respond to religious and national origin harassment of students by fellow-students. The Resolution Agreement (
full text) supplements a May 2013 agreement (
full text) that settled a lawsuit brought by a Sikh student who had been repeatedly harassed and bullied. (
2013 Sikh Coalition release.) That agreement required implementation of a safety plan for that student and anti-harassment training. Last week's settlement (
Sikh Coalition release) grew out of the Justice Department's continuing examination of the school district's harassment policies. Among other things, it requires the school district:
to develop and implement annual age and position-appropriate trainings on religious and national origin harassment for all students, staff who interact with students (including administrators, teachers, counselors, and bus drivers), and District-level administrators who interact with students or who are involved in addressing harassment or bullying in the District. The District will implement separate student- and staff-specific trainings....
All trainings must include:
A facilitated discussion of the root causes of religious and national origin harassment and the harms resulting from such conduct, including but not limited to issues related to post-9/11 backlash and the perpetuation of negative stereotypes impacting the Sikh, Muslim, South Asian, and Arab-American communities....
