Acclaimed Cape HS Teacher Forced Out By Anti-LGBT Board and Parents
LEWES, Del. — A highly acclaimed teacher and theater director at a high school in Delaware near Rehoboth Beach who served as faculty adviser for the school’s Gay-Straight Alliance Club was forced to submit her resignation earlier this year based on what students and parents believe to be anti-LGBT bias.
Martha Pfeiffer, who heads the theater department at Cape Henlopen High School in the city of Lewes, is scheduled to end her seven-year stint at the school when the spring 2017 semester ends on June 16.
Her departure follows a stormy two-year period in which students, parents and others who know Pfeiffer say she was hounded by school administrators for what her supporters say was her outspoken support for the school’s LGBT students in her role as a committed straight ally.
“They were out to get her for years,” said a former school employee who spoke on condition of not being identified. “I think it was pretty much a trumped up charge against her.”
I feel for Martha Pfeiffer. I honestly wish she would fight this longer. But I respect her decision, however she wanted to go. What the board did was, by all appearances, perverse. It is hard to ignore that Ms. Pfeiffer turned in her resignation. I hope her attorney negotiated a fair severance package. And are the voters in Lewes willing to pay for the decisions of a few…
What did she do to deserve this horrible treatment? I am confused. I would think the community would rally around her big time.
not THAT community.
Jee-zus. My daughter helped to found the Gay-Straight Alliance at her high school when she was a student. I know that Ms. Pfeiffer would be welcomed with open arms there.
A classic cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face move by Cape.
Chris, If you click through to the Blade story. The trumped up pretext was that she did not return from NYC on the bus with students.
I can’t find anything about this in any of the local media. All media references to Pfeiffer are overwhelmingly positive except for one story from 2014, also in the Blade, when she was criticized for giving advice to a student who told her he was feeling bullied by his parents. (http://www.washingtonblade.com/2014/12/23/del-high-school-administrators-attack-gsa/)
The school board will happily take the property and rental taxes generated by its sizeable gay community, but its tolerance only goes so far.