Max Hightower, center with hat, performs in Little Shop of Horrors at Sherman High School.
Philip Hightower
The Sherman Independent School District (SISD) is the latest school district in Texas to take a stand against transgender students and extracurricular activities. This time, however, it has nothing to do with transgender athletes or sports of any kind.
Max Hightower, a transgender student at Sherman High School, won the role of the smooth-talking Ali Hakim in a student production of the musical Oklahoma!, but school officials rescinded the offer "because my child was not born a male," according to Max's father Philip, as he wrote on a Facebook post.
Max says he first found out about the district's policy — which has yet to be determined despite many parents calling the district demanding answers — from his mom, who texted him while he was still in class. He originally went to find the school's theater director, Kyle Nichols, for an explanation but learned that Nichols had been escorted off the campus.
"I can only assume it's because he resisted this," Max says. "I started crying. I had to leave."
Sherman High School Principal Scott Johnston met with several of the affected students to inform them of the district's decision to recast the play along assigned gender guidelines that could only align with the gender of the characters in the production. Max says Johnston told them, "Sherman High School is going to be taking a new path."
"They made a new policy where the role cast would be as the gender assigned at birth," Max says. "I got really upset and I couldn't speak properly. I said, 'Why?' and [Johnston] said, 'Good question, Max' and that it was an administrative decision."
Since Max's story reached the national spotlight, more parents have come forward to say that the district dismissed even more students from their roles in the production because the characters they played didn't match with the gender they were assigned at birth.
From 5 to 7 students involved with the Sherman High School production had their roles reassigned because of their gender, according to several students' parents.
The decisions weren't limited to transgender students. At least two cisgender female students were told they couldn't play male roles in the production.
Betty Price says her daughter CJ was cast to play a cowboy named Sam in the Oklahoma! production after auditioning in male roles, simply because she wanted to perform but also "didn't want to wear a dress." CJ's offer was also rescinded, thanks to the district's new blanket policy regarding the playing of gender roles.
Price has made several calls and an in-person visit to Sherman High School's principal but all of her requests were met with offers to take down her information. She says her daughter didn't get a call that her part would be recast; instead, she heard about it "through the grapevine" from other students.
"She really loves the theater," Price says. "This has totally bummed her out about the district not supporting the theater program, the theater director and the choir director [Heidi Scheibmeir] supporting the production, and this is her senior year. This is her last production. It's put a whole big, wet blanket over the whole thing."
Max's father, Philip Hightower, says he got the call regarding Max's role first from Johnston on Nov. 3, a week after he was cast, after the previous student in the role had to step away from the production.
"He was not rude or anything like that but he was short and to the point," Philip says of Johnston. "The whole call lasted maybe a minute, a minute and a half. He said, 'Well, unfortunately, I have to tell you that we've just instituted a new policy.' I can't remember if he said at Sherman High or Sherman [Independent School District] but the policy is that 'only males can play male roles and only females can play female roles.' This is directly verbatim because when you hear something like that, you don't forget it."
To say that Max was disappointed would be an understatement. He says he had already dedicated a lot of time to his part and was incredibly enthusiastic about his role.
"I was coming to rehearsal every day," Max says. "I was reading my script in class. I followed my sister's advice and recorded my lines and listened to them while I was sleeping. I memorized half of my script, and it was already like day three."
A mother who wished to be identified as Liz says her daughter was cast in the Oklahoma! production as one of the cowboys, a part identified in the story as a male character because of the time period in which it is set. She got a similar call on Friday that her daughter would not be allowed to continue working her role in the performance.
"I asked why or what happened or something and [Johnston] basically repeated the policy, and it's clear I wasn't going to get any more of an explanation than that," Liz says. "They've been rehearsing for a couple of months with no issue. Max was recast and it was about a week and a half after that we all got phone calls."
The school district sent a memo to parents in the wake of the recasting decision for the high school's production of Oklahoma!
Courtesy of Philip Hightower
The email sent with the subject line "Oklahoma! Musical Dates to Be Rescheduled" states that the musical itself "contained mature adult themes, profane language and sexual content" and that "all aspects of the production need to be reviewed including content, stage production/props and casting to ensure that the production is appropriate for the high school age."
The email also says that no district policy exists that requires students play roles that match the gender to which they were assigned at birth but "as it is relates to this particular production, the sex of the role as identified in the script will be used when casting. Because the nature and subject matter of productions vary, the District is not inclined to apply this criteria to all future productions."
"This is just the biggest back peddling," Highwater says. "It's just word soup. I was blown away by it. I honestly think that they didn't think anybody would protest because if they did, they would've had something else ready."
Liz says no one from the school district told her or her child that anyone had an issue with the content of the classic Oscar Hammerstein musical.
"The statement barely mentioned the gender issue and instead focuses on something that wasn't mentioned to us at all," Liz says.
Parents say they are going to bring up the issue to the Sherman ISD school board on Monday during its open forum, even if it's not on the school board's agenda.
The only positive outcome of this mismanaged policy enforcement is the outpouring of support the students have received and shown to each other.
"It's been cool to see all the students stand with and for each other and be outraged on behalf of not just themselves but everyone affected," Liz says. "There was a lot of crying and the first two or three days were really rough. [My daughter] is resilient and great and just wants to stand up for what's right and as far as I can tell, all the other kids want the same thing."
We reached out to Sherman High School and Sherman ISD officials for comment but phone calls and messages were not returned.
