For a month beginning in mid-September, Carrie Schmidt, mother of a Gardner-Edgerton High School junior, sought information from the USD 231 administration about an alleged 2024 incident involving a male transitioning to a female in the girls’ locker room. School officials, primarily Superintendent Dr. Brian Huff, would not confirm to her such an incident took place. After a series of back-and-forth emails Schmidt resorted to a Kansas Open Records Act (KORA) request, and received an email sent by Huff to school officials last December confirming such an incident took place.
Schmidt’s persistent requests for information stemmed from a reliable source that a male transitioning to a female was allowed in the girls’ locker room, sometime between the start of the 2024-25 school year and December and was discovered there, which was a violation of school policy:
Accessibility
Students will only use the restroom or locker room that conforms with the student’s sex at
birth or use any unisex facilities available to students. The usage of any restroom, locker
room or changing room that does not conform to the student’s sex at birth will not be permitted.
Emails obtained by The Sentinel show each of Schmidt’s requests received a similar response:
On September 16th, an email to Gardner-Edgerton Superintendent Dr. Brian Huff from Schmidt on two other concerns, one of which was the social media post by science teacher Leslie Hanzelka mocking the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, was her first mention of the locker room allegation:
Isn’t that kinda like this district keeping from parents like me that their daughter could have been naked in the locker room with a boy present last year for months? I would like to know more about that, too, since my daughter used the locker room last year and possibly was seen by a boy without all her clothes on.
Dr. Huff’s response on September 17th to her question on the locker room incident:
You also mentioned a concern with a boy in the girls locker room seeing girls naked. I am not aware of a situation where a boy saw girls naked in the locker room. We have specific policy prohibiting students from being in a locker room that does not match their gender. If this policy is broken and if a student sees another student naked, then we absolutely will inform the parent of both children. Let me know if you feel we should speak to your daughter regarding a situation where she feels she was naked in the presence of a boy while in the locker room. We will investigate such an allegation.
The email pattern continues with Huff dismissing Schmidt’s requests for information about the allegation and subsequent investigation, including the possibility of video confirmation.
September 18th:
I also will not comment further on student behavior issues, other than to reiterate that we will absolutely investigate any allegations your daughter may have regarding being seen naked by a male student in a locker room. All of my uses of the terms male and female or other gender specific terms are according to the State of Kansas definitions.
September 24th:
Thanks for the feedback. I have nothing to add beyond my previous response to you.
September 26th:
I have answered your concern in a previous email. I have nothing further to add.
September 29th:
My answers are there. I also see no reason to respond further to any of the issues you have brought. This will be my last response.
October 6th:
Right now, we have no information leading us to believe she was in a locker room or restroom with a male student. We will absolutely look into any situation carefully where she feels she was in a space designated for females with a male present. You can contact the high school to initiate this if you wish. We are also willing to partner with someone like Sunflower House if you feel the conversation will be too difficult.
As for our videos, we keep them as long as we have storage room. The video is automatically deleted as storage runs out. This is typically about 30 days.
October 7th:
Carrie: I will and have answered concerns regarding your daughter. I can confirm that we have policy prohibiting students from being in gender specific spaces if they are not that gender (genetic sex). I am not going to answer questions about a violation of policy by another student unless it has an impact on one of your children. You can contact the school for specific concerns you have regarding your daughter and a male being in a gender specific space with her. We will investigate such an issue following our normal process.
As I mentioned before, I will not answer any more emails on this subject that are not specific to your children.
October 8th:
Carrie: You may have misunderstood my reply earlier on when to contact the school. I have copied it below. The questions you posed to the high school administration are not related to the concerns I outlined here:
You can contact the school for specific concerns you have regarding your daughter and a male being in a gender specific space with her. We will investigate such an issue following our normal process.
They will not be responding to your questions.
I am thankful to our BOE for being the first BOE in the state to enact a policy that outlines the expectations of restroom and locker room use. This has been affirmed in state law since then. We are committed to maintaining the policy as written.
Schmidt told The Sentinel she objected to what she saw as Dr. Huff referring to her daughter in avoiding her questions about the locker room incident:
“Dr. Huff was purposely deflecting my question about the transgender investigation to its effect on my daughter. My concern was not just about my daughter’s safety, but that of all the girls who could be affected by this violation of school policy.”
Her many appeals to the Gardner-Edgerton district rebuffed, Schmidt turned to the KORA, a state law often used by media, but available to all Kansans searching for information that governmental organizations, including school districts, are reluctant to provide.
On October 13th, ironically the date of a school board meeting, Schmidt received what she had sought, confirmation that the alleged incident was no longer “alleged”:
She took Dr. Huff to task that evening in the public comment period of the school board meeting, addressing him directly:
Since September 16th, I have been trying to get you to answer a question for me. That question is: From August to November 2024, was a male, someone born with a penis, using female-only spaces repeatedly under a teacher’s watch in the high school, yes or no? I didn’t ask you any identifying information on any student. I asked if it happened. You refused to answer me.
“So last week, I made a KORA request asking you for any documents pertaining to my question from November 1 to December 10th, 2024. I only needed one email to prove this, and this morning, one email is all I got with Dr. Huff as the author, and it read, ‘Be ready to discuss the trans girl in the girl locker situation for the executive session for personnel Monday. The focus needs to be on the adjustments we have made to avoid this happening in the future. I have detailed this situation for Lana (Sutton, Board Vice-President) and Tom (Reddin, Board President) already. I do not foresee this being a big issue since there was a good outcome with a solid plan to avoid a repeat.’
“Dr. Huff, you almost made it out without having any paper trail, huh? Why wouldn’t you want parents like me to know what the “good outcome” was or your plan to avoid a repeat? What are you scared of? Is it that the Department of Justice is doing investigations into stuff like this? Or is it because you know that this violates the Kansas Women’s Bill of Rights, which gives parents of children who were victims of this the ability to sue you? Did you tell that to the parents whose daughters were 1,000% violated for months in the locker room? ? Or was this kept such a good secret that you were able to contain it to only one parent knowing?
“Let’s go back to our email communication. For some reason, you attached your district lawyer to our email thread early on and never took them off. Were you trying to intimidate me? A parent of a daughter asking you questions that would directly impact my family? You dismissed me as if my concerns were not valid. It’s clear you pick and choose what you want parents to know, because that gives the appearance of transparency. What a deceitful and despicable way to practice as the superintendent of this district. With all due respect, people in this community are fed up with (expletive) like this, just so you know, they won’t tell you that, though, because they’ve seen how you retaliate against people who ask tough questions. Our daughters deserve better.
“The only question you did answer was if you still had video footage from August to November of 2024. You said no. Isn’t that convenient for you? No evidence means you control the narrative, right? In closing, this is my next question to you. Did anyone in November of 2024 watch the 30 days of video footage you still had, to see what girls were using the female locker rooms and bathrooms unknowingly with a male while in the high school? If so, did you contact the parents to tell them? I look forward to your answer, and please don’t play games.”
What did Schmidt learn on her journey to the truth?
“USD231 has an accountability and transparency issue, and that is due to their leadership, which starts with Dr. Huff and the School Board. How arrogant must someone be, knowing they wrote an email with their district account regarding the transgender girl using the female locker room, yet refuse to admit it happened when confronted about it? No one should have to KORA request documents to find out if the school is keeping their child safe.
“The district forgot that not only am I a Kansas taxpayer, but I am also a parent of a daughter in the district. I have every right to know what goes on in the high school. Dr. Huff’s responses to me were deceitful, manipulative, and dismissive. I believe the leaders in this district have an unethical practice of giving “non-answer” answers to parents with hopes to keep them at bay. Not only is that an insult to our intelligence, but it is completely unacceptable and unprincipled. I trusted district staff to follow the Transgender Policy and Kansas State Law about locker rooms and bathrooms. I believed they would tell me the truth about the situation.
“To date, Dr. Huff has not answered my questions. I sent the district another email on October 16, 2025, reminding them that I am still waiting for answers. It should concern everyone that the leaders of USD231 are willing to withhold information from parents and people in the community to protect themselves over students.”
