Feds launch a civil rights investigation into Texas school district

The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights is investigating allegations of discrimination in a Texas school district, NBC News reports.

Why it matters: Carroll Independent School District, which is located in wealthy, suburban Southlake, Texas, has been at the forefront of the ongoing national battle over how to teach students about racial issues.

• The department notified Carroll ISD’s officials that it has opened three investigations into complaints about discrimination against students based on their race, gender and national origin, according to NBC News.
• The Department of Education has the power to require a school district to make policy changes and submit to federal monitoring.

Context: District officials promised to make sweeping changes three years ago, after a video of Southlake high school students chanting the N-word went viral — though those changes never came.

• In Southlake’s most recent elections, candidates running on an anti-critical race theory platform won the majority of school board seats, effectively killing the proposed diversity plan.

What they’re saying: “Our focus will always be what is best for our students as we prepare them for their next steps in their educational journey,” Karen Fitzgerald, a Carroll ISD spokesperson, told NBC.

The bottom line: These investigations can take months or years, so the Southlake saga is far from over.