The valedictorian at a Wisconsin high school said administrators prevented him from speaking a commencement ceremonies because of his sexual orientation, WISN reported.
Nat Werth said he presented a draft of his speech to school administrators at Sheboygan Lutheran High School on May 20. The speech included references about his struggles as a gay student and criticisms of biblical references to homosexuality, the Sheboygan Press reported.
When administrators removed the references, Werth said he offered to rework the speech, but school officials decided to let the school salutatorian speak at last Friday’s commencement, the newspaper reported.
"I told them that I wanted to work together to create a speech that would be appropriate to give at graduation and they didn't want to hear it," Werth told WISN. "They said that their suspicions had been confirmed and they didn't trust me to give what I had written, regardless if we worked together or not.
"I think they were looking for me to misstep, to say something so that I couldn't give my speech at graduation," Werth told WISN. "Deep down, I knew that they didn't trust me."
Werth was forced to listen while the school’s salutatorian spoke in his place.
"It was kind of difficult to watch (the salutatorian's) speech without giving my own," Werth told the Press.
Paul Gnan, the executive director at Sheboygan Lutheran, declined to speak about Werth’s speech or his attempt to join the dance team, citing confidentiality issues, the newspaper reported. Gnan did say, however, that the school’s policies are based on biblical principles.
"There are policies in our handbook that talk about our faith and our belief system and what it's based on," Gnan told the Press.
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