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Amherst schools push back on reinstatement of guidance counselor in misgendering controversy
An attorney for Delinda Dykes said the district’s appeal is without merit and “nothing more than a stall tactic.”
Amherst school officials are heading to court in an effort to block the reinstatement of a middle school guidance counselor who was fired after she allegedly misgendered and deadnamed students in a scandal that made national headlines.
The Amherst-Pelham Regional School District filed a complaint Wednesday to vacate a recent arbitration decision reinstating Delinda Dykes, one of several Amherst Regional Middle School employees at the center of a 2023 student newspaper exposé. The article in The Graphic alleged Dykes and another guidance counselor routinely referred to transgender students by the wrong names and pronouns, failed to support students experiencing gender-based bullying, and invoked anti-LGBTQ+ prayer at school.
Amherst schools:
Dykes disputed the allegations in the article and appealed her 2023 firing, winning her reinstatement last month.
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“Many have continued to make false and harmful allegations about me,” Dykes said in a July 30 statement. “Let me be clear, I am innocent.”
She maintains she did not receive due process in her firing, and that the evidence levied against her was insufficient. The school district says otherwise.
In its complaint, Amherst-Pelham Regional Public Schools argued the arbitrator “exceeded her powers in issuing this award” and also noted a previous Title IX investigation concluded Dykes “repeatedly misgendered students after having been corrected on numerous occasions, and made inappropriate comments related to gender and sexual orientation.”
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The school district alleges those statements included a reference to the “gay agenda,” among other comments. Once, while advising a student who’d had a dispute with a friend over a girlfriend, Dykes purportedly remarked “that some guys ‘like to pass girls around amongst their friends,’” according to the complaint.
The district further noted the arbitrator disregarded certain testimony about Dykes’s alleged misgendering because her comments were in front of other adults, not students.
Dykes is due to be reinstated as a guidance counselor for the upcoming school year, effective Aug. 25.
Amherst-Pelham Superintendent Dr. E. Xiomara Herman previously said the arbitrator’s decision “made clear” certain procedural deficiencies contributed to Dykes’s reinstatement, including the lack of documented progressive discipline and limited evidentiary records. Still, she and Regional School Committee Chair Sarahbess Kenney suggested fighting Dykes’s reinstatement is in students’ best interest.
“The Regional School Committee remains deeply committed to creating a safe, supportive, and equitable learning environment for all children,” Kenney said in a statement. “This decision reflects that commitment and our duty to uphold the values of our school communities.”
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Herman said the appeal is “one step toward doing right by our students by ensuring that the systems our staff and students rely on are aligned with our district values.”
She added: “We recognize that parts of our system may need to improve, and we’re committed to doing that work with children at the center of every action we take.”
Dykes, for her part, said she shares “everyone’s concern about the safety and well-being of all students, including those who identify as LGBTQIA+ and I will never waver in my commitment to help all students.”
An attorney for Dykes, James Shaw, said in a statement the school district’s appeal is “completely without merit.”
“This is nothing more than a stall tactic, and we fully expect the Superior Court to apply longstanding and well-established law by upholding the Arbitrator’s thoughtful and well-reasoned decision,” Shaw added.
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