On Feb. 27 Frisco ISD parents, students and staff members met for a board of trustees meeting. An abundance of outrage and support was presented in relation to recent allegations against board member Marvin Lowe.
During Frisco ISD’s community input meeting, participants brought up the recent allegations against Lowe in regard to the harassment of a transgender student at a state educational conference in San Antonio last year. According to The Dallas Morning News, a then-16-year-old transgender student, from a school district outside of North Texas, said Lowe made him feel “dehumanized, violated and unsafe” after he spoke on a panel last September at a state educational conference.
The student and parents allege that Lowe approached the student after he spoke during a session of the conference, titled “Transgender Students in Texas Schools: What You Need to Know.” Lowe allegedly approached the teen and began talking about what he described as the locker room environment.
“Men like to walk around naked with their junk hanging around,” Lowe said, according to the student’s complaint. “He then said that having a person with differing external genitalia walking around naked wouldn’t be OK because ‘that’s the type of thing that turns people on.’”
During the Feb. 27 meeting, multiple parents and staff members spoke to the board calling the alleged behavior “a circus sideshow” and “a verbal attack of a student.”
Before reading the complaint at the board meeting, Amy Baker, a former principal in the district, said she personally knows the family whose child spoke at the conference. “The behavior of Mr. Lowe during that interaction represents a flagrant abuse of power, an intentional violation of personal boundaries, and deplorable conduct unbecoming of any Frisco ISD representative that warrants a punitive and consequential response from our community,” Baker said.
Debra Nelson, Nelson Middle School’s namesake also expressed her disappointment in the alleged actions of Lowe and called for his resignation.
“As an adult, I can never imagine a time that I would verbally attack a student,” Nelson said during the meeting. “I can’t think of a time, ever, as an educator. I certainly can’t think of a time as an elected official that someone would do that. Now I wasn’t there so I don’t know what happened. Mr. Lowe was there, I was not. But I do know, Mr. Lowe, if it happened, and it’s alleged, I ask you to do the right thing for this school district and resign your position.”
Other speakers said they know Lowe and do not believe he would ever do something like that to a student.
“To take these accusations made about Marvin and use them to dismiss or dishonor this wonderful man would be a huge injustice to not only Marvin but to his wife and four children who are students in this school district,” another speaker said.
Despite the fact that board members were not there to speak, only to listen, Lowe interjected multiple times saying the allegations were “false, untrue and unfounded.”
Frisco ISD told Local Profile that “because district administration does not have the authority to take any action in regard to Trustee conduct, the allegations were forwarded to the District’s Board of Trustees. The Frisco ISD Board Operating Procedures describe the process the board uses to address the conduct of individual trustees.”
Information regarding how the investigation will occur within the board can be found here in the Board Operating Procedures.
Frisco ISD is no stranger to issues regarding trans kids. Local Profile previously reported in Nov. 2022, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed formal complaints about the district's “anti-trans” bathroom policies.
