- December 11, 2024
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Following remarks made during the 2024 Moms for Liberty Joyful Warriors National Summit in late August, School Board Chair Jessie Thompson's leadership will be reconsidered in January.
The School Board unanimously voted on Tuesday to revisit its decision made at the Nov. 19 organizational meeting to appoint Thompson as board chair. The decision came after statements by Thompson came to light involving feeding fake data to the board to get agenda items approved and questioning the graduation rate for Deltona High School, which was 100% last year. Deltona High, a Title 1 school, is also one of the district's A schools.
"Now, I've walked that school multiple times," Thompson said at the summit. "I've met some bright students, and I've met some students that I wouldn't trust filling up my tank of gas, so I find it really hard to believe that they graduate."
She said graduation was now equivalent to handing out "participation ribbons."
Thompson was speaking as part of a session called "How to Work With Your School Board at the summit, which is available as an unlisted video on the Moms for Liberty YouTube page. Her remarks about Deltona High triggered a call for her resignation by Deltona Mayor Santiago Avila on Facebook, who said this is "unacceptable and is also an insult to the hard-working students and staff of this A-rated school."
He also criticized her verbiage of calling District 5 School Board member Ruben Colon a "tan man" during the session as unprofessional; Thompson spoke at length on not getting along with her fellow board members and their alleged hate of her.
“I'm on a minority school board, just in case we weren't aware, like I'm hated by the rest of my board, and I can deal with that emotionally," Thompson said at the summit. "They're not nice people.”
At the summit, Thompson recommended passing false data on to School Board members to get agenda items approved, saying she had done it to a "couple people" and that's how she managed to get certain safety and security things passed.
"Fun fact, if you really want to mess up someone's day on a school board and you don't like them, you can feed them false data, and I guarantee that they are going to Ron Burgundy it and not research it," Thompson said.
Ron Burgundy is a character in the movie Anchorman.
Thompson also said she lied to the district prior to being a school member about her children having a medical condition to avoid them wearing masks during the pandemic.
The Volusia Chapter of Moms for Liberty is also in favor of removing Thompson as chair — as well as from the board entirely.
Chapter member Anna Hannon said in an email to the Observer that lying to the board, particularly on an issue concerning school security, is grounds for removal.
"Thompson has not been affiliated with Moms for Liberty Volusia since 2021 and went to the Moms for Liberty 2024 Conference without us knowing," Hannon said. "The deceptive and condescending nature of Mrs. Thompson during her campaigning is one of the reasons early that we decided not to endorse her as a school board candidate."
Chapter Chair Jenifer Kelly said in a statement that she reached out to Moms for Liberty National after viewing the video of the breakout session, letting them know she was embarrassed that a Volusia County School Board member encouraged a room full of Moms for Liberty members from across the country to lie and feed the boards false information.
"Even worse, admitted she had done that herself and lied about her children's health status to gain an advantage over other children who were being forced to mask in school at the time," Kelly said. "National said they had not watched that session yet but they would be. They were very concerned with the short clips I attached to that email. They will be changing procedures to create a better vetting process for any upcoming speaking/summit events in the future."
During his closing comments at the Dec. 10 meeting, Colon said there was an elephant in the room the board needed to address, prompting Thompson to speak, who soon apologized for her statements.
"I chose those words poorly," she said. "I do sincerely believe that all of our students deserve the best education — every single one, and so I am looking forward to working with our superintendent, because I know she as well believes that our students are made for greatness, and they can absolutely get there."
She also apologized to the board, calling this incident a "growing moment."
"I know these words, it's going to take time, but moving forward, I think that we will be a stronger, better board, and I will always be focused on putting our students first and making sure that they get the best possible education, because they really are the reason that I'm here," Thompson said.
Colon said one of the privileges the board holds is the election of its chair, as though their votes are all equal, the chair represents them as a board.
"I don't think any of us — there's none of us here — that were not affected by those words," Colon said.
He said he believed Thompson's apology was genuine, but that words can be hurtful, particularly those about the district's student.
"We're big people, we can handle it," Colon said. "We're politicians. People say whatever they want to say. We're used to that. But when it affects our kids, when comments are made to disparage our children, that crosses over into a different world."
