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EQUAL EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES

In recognition of the diversified characteristics and needs of our students and with the keen desire to be responsive to them, the School Committee will make every effort to protect the dignity of the students as individuals. It also will offer careful considera­tion and sympathetic understanding of their personal feelings, par­ticularly with reference to their race, color, sex, gender identity, homelessness, religion, na­tional origin, sexual orientation or physical and intellectual differences.

To accomplish this, the Committee and its staff will make every ef­fort to comply with the letter and the spirit of the Massachusetts equal educational opportunities law, which prohibits discrimination in public school ad­missions and programs. The law reads as follows:

No child shall be excluded from or discriminated against in admission to a public school of any town, or in obtaining the advantages, privileges and course of study of such public school on account of race, color, sex, gender identity, religion, national origin or sexual orientation.

This will mean that every student will be given equal opportunity in school admission, admissions to courses, course content, guidance, and extracurricular and athletic activities.

All implementing provisions issued by the Board of Education in compliance with this law will be followed.

SOURCE: MASC

LEGAL REFS.: Title VI, Civil Rights Act of 1964

Title VII, Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended by the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972

Executive Order 11246, as amended by E.O. 11375

Title IX, Education Amendments of 1972

M.G.L. 76:5; 76:16 (Chapter 622 of the Acts of 1971)

BESE Regulations 603 CMR 26:00

BESE Regulations 603 CMR 28:00

CROSS REF.: AC, Nondiscrimination

NOTE: The cross reference is to a related statement in this manual. The change in 1993 was to add the classification of sexual orientation in the specific definitions protected by law against discrimination.

Adopted on: April 10, 2008

Revised on: September 13, 2012

Revised on: July 28, 2016