A single mother of two from Akron, Ohio, is calling out a Christian school in what she claims authorities expelled her two daughters because they have different fathers and because she’s unmarried.
In a lengthy post on Facebook, 30-year-old Summer Grant explained why her children shouldn’t suffer as result of her past and why it was so wrong for the Chapel Hill Christian School to take such an action.
“This situation has really put me in a bind mentally!!! I can say I’ve done some “not so ok things” in my life,” she wrote. “Done some things I probably shouldn’t have but I don’t want to be judged as a bad person! N I especially don’t want my kids to be judged for my actions. Regardless of my personal life I’m a really good mother!”.
Speaking with the Akron Beacon Journal, Grant called out the school in what she claims was a wrongful dismissal of her daughters, 10-year old Summara-Rayn and 7-year-old Summaia.
“Just because I’m not married and my children do have different fathers doesn’t mean that I don’t want my children to have a good education and I don’t want them to know who Christ is in their education,” she said.
According to Grant, she initially thought the school administrator, John Wilson, was looking out for her when he constantly asked her when she would be marrying Summaia’s father, whom she was involved with at the time she was in the first grade.
“Honestly, I thought it was just coming from a place of being a pastor and just being concerned and wanting the best for us, at first,” she said. “It just started to be uncomfortable because it was just all the time.”
She also added that she suspected the school had issues with her marital status when she met Wilson last July to discuss a scholarship for his daughters for the next school year. According to Grant, the discussion abruptly turned into a judgmental one.
“It wasn’t about whether they had their scholarship in place,” she said. “It was more or less about me just not living right … It was an uncomfortable conversation, but I sat through it because I really wanted my children to go to the school.”
Grant further told the Akron Beacon Journal things took a turn for the worst last Wednesday when Summara had an incident with the school bus driver. She said she also got involved in the case the next morning to try and address the situation. The police eventually had to be called in to calm the situation – but her daughters were dismissed the next afternoon.
In a phone conversation with Wilson, Grant said she asked him if the girls’ dismissal was as a result of the bus incident to which he replied saying it wasn’t solely the reason.
“He said no. He said the bus incident just shed a light on many problems that we have with you,” Grant said.
According to Grant, Wilson also added that she was an adulterer who was disobeying the Ten Commandments.
“I understand I’m not married and fornication would be what I committed, not adultery!” she wrote in her Facebook post. “However I’ve been the same unmarried women with children who have different fathers since the day he first accepted me n my children and the money for them to attend and that’s where he’s wrong at.”
In a statement sent to the Akron Beacon Journal from the school about Grant’s accusations, they said parents sign a written agreement “to conduct themselves in accordance with expressed guidelines of conduct.” Grant, however, said she doesn’t remember signing that agreement.
“While we believe it would be wrong to make to the public the particular circumstances that led to this separation, out of concern for the privacy of the family, we also felt that dismissal was necessary in order to protect the safety of our school children and their families,” a portion of the statement also read.
Grant said she’s exploring the possibility of homeschooling the girls for the rest of the academic year though she fears they could lose their chances of securing private school scholarships.
