In the wake of the alleged assault and rape of an Ooltewah High School freshman by three of his basketball teammates, District 3 Hamilton County School Board member Greg Martin, who represents the Hixson area and serves as chairman of the board’s policy committee, has formed a Special Citizens Advisory Committee to look at the board’s policy on harassment and hazing.
“I formed the committee to help the community address the concerns that are in our school system about hazing and bullying that in this case resulted in a crime,” Martin said, referencing the assault and rape of an OHS basketball player that reportedly occurred at a rented cabin Dec. 22 on an overnight trip the team took a tournament in Gatlinburg, Tenn. “I believe this is a public school system and not a professional school system, and that the more the public is engaged, the better our school system will be.”
Martin said his goal in forming the committee is to have members of the Superintendent’s Student Advisory Council, the Hamilton County PTA Council look over the policy committee’s shoulders and provide input as the committee develops policies to best serve the school system.
“I think community input and not just professional input is important when it comes to issues affecting the community,” he said.
Hixson High School wrestling coach Garrick Hall serves as chairman of the committee. On the committee are Wayne Brown, president of Bridge-N-the-Gap, a local organization with the goal of improving communities; community volunteer Grant Crosslin; Everlina Holmes of UnifiED, a community movement of parents, teachers and students seeking to improve public schools; Hamilton County Juvenile Court Judge Rob Philyaw; Marcus Perez, owner of Elite Behavior Analysis, a company that provides behavior analysis for schools; and parent and community volunteer Lee Rogers.
Rogers said she has a daughter in the Soddy-Daisy High School Band, and attended a school board meeting following the alleged rape to find out how it would affect its policies for the overnight trips taken by the band. She said she is not concerned about bullying at SDHS specifically, as she is not aware of anything to cause concern, though she is sure some sort of bullying and hazing has likely happened there.
“We want to go over the current policies in place and make sure we don’t have any vague areas, that everything is black and white and people know what’s expected,” she said of the committee’s goal.
After the OHS incident, it came to the board’s attention that its policy on student harassment, hazing and bullying does not meet the requirements of state law and is not on par with similar policies in other large school districts across the state.
According to state law, school districts are required to have a policy prohibiting harassment, intimidation and bullying, and the policy must include 13 specified provisions. Hamilton County’s policy does not meet two of the required provisions and minimally meets the standards set on a handful of other provisions.
Specifically, Hamilton County’s policy does not include a way for students to anonymously report incidents or a procedure discouraging students from discussing others in a sexual manner or smearing their character because of allegations of sexual promiscuity.
Tennessee Department of Education Spokeswoman Ashley Ball said it is up to local school boards, in conjunction with their attorneys, to draft and adopt bullying and harassment policies.
“We hope to get our work done by the time school’s out,” Martin said of his committee’s work on revising the policies.
He encourages anyone in the community who wants to provide input on school board policies to contact him at martin_greg@hcde.org.
Staff writer Kendi Anderson contributed to this story.