Diversity, Equity, Inclusion materials (Guilderland Central School District, Guilderland Center)

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to the New York Freedom of Information Law, I hereby request the following records:

All materials and correspondence between the district Board of Education, district Administration, district Equity Committee or Office, Faculty, Staff, Third Party Contractors and Consultants related to the following terms, subjects or concepts between April 2021 to the date this request is fulfilled:

Race
Anti-racism
Racism
Equity
Culturally Responsive
Decolonize
Diversity
Implicit Bias
Intersectionality
Microaggression
Oppression
Patriarchy
People of Color
Privilege(d)
Safe Space
Social Justice
Tokenism
White Supremacy

This request shall also include any teachings of such curriculum mentioned above by any faculty employed within the school district, third party contractors, consultants or other third parties invited by the school or agents of the school.

This request shall also include any documents or materials accessed by the school district, but stored on third party service providers on behalf of the district, and links/references/credentials for access to such materials if present in emails or electronic systems or files stored in browser caches, cloud storage (i.e. Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, etc), or local hard drives managed by the district. This request shall also include non-school email and texting services used by the district, board, administration and faculty to conduct activities and business related to the school district (i.e. Gmail, Outlook, etc).

This request shall also include any training material or supplemental information provided to district staff, whether required or suggested.

Please keep in mind, pursuant to the Retention and Disposition Schedule for New York Local Government Records (LGS-01): Any record listed in the LGS-01 Schedule for which a Freedom of Information (FOIL) request has been received should not be destroyed until that request has been answered and until any potential appeal is made and resolved, even if the retention period of the record has passed.

The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.

In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 5 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Jackson Parker

Subject: Urgent FOIL Appeal for Lack of Response to Request for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Materials

I am writing to formally appeal the lack of response to my Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request, originally submitted on 3/10/2023, regarding Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion materials within the Guilderland Central School District. The request was acknowledged, and a completion date of April 10, 2023, was provided. However, as of today, no records have been furnished, and there has been no further communication from your office.

### Legal Obligations and Violations Observed

1. **Failure to Complete Original Request**: The original request has not been fulfilled within the time frame specified by FOIL, which is a violation of the law.
2. **Lack of Transparency and Accountability**: FOIL is designed to ensure that the public has unimpaired access to government records.

### Relevant Case Law and Advisory Opinions

In the case of *Matter of Madden v. Village of Tuxedo Park*, the court stated:

> "The Freedom of Information Law was enacted for the benefit of the public to encourage governmental accountability and transparency."

Your failure to respond not only violates the spirit of FOIL but also undermines public trust and accountability.

### Request for Expedited Response

Given the public interest in this matter and the already delayed response, I kindly request that you expedite this FOIL appeal and provide the requested records as a matter of utmost urgency.

Thank you for your immediate attention to this critical matter.