As I continue to watch Douglas County School Board meetings and listen to our elected school board members, I am increasingly surprised — and disheartened — by how frequently they focus on manufactured culture wars and attacks on the transgender community, which represents a very small portion of our student population.
As a longtime resident, parent, and teacher in the Douglas County School District, I am frustrated by the way national political agendas are being inserted into our local schools. I am far less concerned about the limited number of trans athletes in our district than I am about the real, pressing challenges we face: persistently low teacher salaries (despite the passage of the 2023 Mill Levy Override), rising incidents of bullying and harassment — particularly against our most vulnerable students — crumbling infrastructure, and an ongoing shortage of bus drivers that forces many students to find alternative, and often unsafe, ways to get to school.
I urge the school board to stop dividing our community with partisan ideologies that do not reflect the values or needs of Douglas County. It’s time to focus on what truly matters: supporting our teachers, protecting all students, and ensuring our schools are safe, inclusive, and effective learning environments for everyone.
Christina Marriott
Highlands Ranch