Nik Rajkovic / news@whmi.com

Hartland Consolidated Schools will “cooperate with any inquiry” into a federal civil rights complaint filed by a father of a high school student alleging “retaliation and viewpoint discrimination,” according to an email from Superintendent Chuck Hughes to WHMI News.

Alex Yarber claims HCS has denied district-sponsored status for his daughter’s proposed Turning Point USA student club due to public comments the then 9th-grader made during a school board meeting in 2023 in “defense of traditional bathroom policies.”

“She spoke about boys being in the girls’ bathroom and how she felt, in her opinion, that should not be allowed,” Yarber told WHMI News.

“A couple of days later, there was a teacher in school that was talking about her speech with her class, in a very disparaging manner. That would be, maybe the beginning of the retaliation right there.”

Yarber also alleges “inconsistent explanations” from school officials regarding club approval authority.

“She goes to them and applies at the beginning of September, and has a teacher sponsor, and the school is telling her she has to wait nine months and apply in May or June. I think that is unacceptable, especially in a case where you already have a well-established group of kids who have already performed community service activities on a very successful basis. There needs to be some consideration given in that particular case,” he said.

Yarber provided WHMI News with a letter dated September 22, 2025, outlining his complaint to both the U.S. Department of Education and U.S. Department of Justice.

He says having a teacher sponsor his daughter’s Turning Point club would allow them to meet during the school day, possibly during seminar time, rather than either before or after school as an unsponsored club, noting roughly three dozen students attended a meeting following the political assassination of Turning Point USA co-founder Charlie Kirk.

Yarber says two faculty members had previously agreed to sponsor the club, but “mysteriously” backed out due to what he believes was pressure from HCS administration.

“Obviously, she has a lot of resilience, because she keeps getting up and fighting for this after being knocked down a few times, which is impressive in my mind,” Yarber added.

“I just think there’s a population of kids that would benefit from this, and it just seems like they’re being denied the opportunity.”

In an email to WHMI News, Superintendent Hughes acknowledged “a Turning Point student club existed as a non-sponsored equal access club last year. This is because for two years the students wishing to start the club could not find a sponsor and no club request form was submitted.”

“This year, no club request form was turned in until Monday, September 22, 2025. This is being evaluated and meetings being held to move forward as the students have obtained a staff member wishing to sponsor their club,” Hughes wrote.

Hughes went on to say, “The district has made an exception to our student club process for this group and will now go back and offer the same exception to another student club request that did not follow the process and were told ‘no’ to ensure that we are not being inconsistent in decision making,” adding “The club has never been denied for any reason other than not having a staff sponsor per Board Policy 5840.”

According to the HCS website, Hartland High School currently has 11 sponsored clubs with no activity fees – including Auto Club, Be The Change, Bible Club, Project Unify and others.

The school also has seven sponsored clubs with activity fees, such as Drama, E-Sports, Quiz Bowl and National Honor Society.

Attached is an adjusted Club Proposal Process Form to clarify expectations for 2025-26 academic year, updated September 1, 2025 based on a concern that it was not specific enough.