This post has been updated.
Nine Fairfax County school board members signed on to a letter last week asking the Virginia High School League to stop hosting events at the evangelical mega-university, which has been home to the several statewide athletic competitions and the league’s debate championship. The move was inspired by Northern Virginia students, including a pair of undefeated debaters from a Fairfax County high school, who boycotted the debate championship, saying they felt unsafe on the campus and that they wanted to take a stand against Falwell’s remarks.
“Muslim-Americans make up a large segment of our community and our student body,” the letter read. “Mr. Falwell’s comments stand in stark contrast to our goal in Fairfax County to create welcoming, inclusive environments and to ensure that all our students have access to the same opportunities.”
The nine board members who signed on to the letter said they backed the students who chose to boycott the event and added that they “find it unfair that our students were put in the position of forsaking their participation in a state championship because of the unwelcoming environment at the host institution.”
Three board members declined to sign the letter and criticized their colleagues for sending it without discussing the matter at an open hearing and without taking a vote. On Thursday, Elizabeth Schultz (Springfield), Jeannette Hough (At-large) and Thomas Wilson (Sully) sent a letter of their own.
“The letter was developed, distributed and then executed within a matter of hours, outside the regular course of business, without the opportunity for public discussion or citizen input and without a recorded Board vote,” the three wrote of the missive signed by the majority of the board. “The letter gives the appearance of an agenda-driven Board prone to political opportunism, which silences the voice of our Fairfax County diverse communities and disenfranchises the whole of our constituencies.”
Falwell accused the board members who signed the first letter of advancing a political agenda and said the letter was unfair to him and to Liberty University.
“It was very disingenuous of the school board to engage in this type of grandstanding to try to falsely paint Liberty University and me as somehow anti-Muslim,” Falwell said.
@RyanLMcElveen @VHSL so dishonest of Fairfax Sch Bd to take my comments out of context to advance political agenda! https://t.co/nXfK3o6ZOI
— Jerry Falwell (@JerryFalwellJr) April 29, 2016
The Virginia High School League has no more events scheduled at Liberty and their contract with the university has ended. This year, the league hosted events on the Lynchburg, Va. campus for some divisions of football, soccer, softball, baseball and indoor track. The executive committee has voted to move all the events — save the indoor track meet — to either William and Mary College or to the town of Salem for next year. Ken Tilley, executive director of the league, said the debate boycott was not a factor in that decision.
The committee will vote on where to hold the debate championships and the indoor track meet in the fall.
