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Second-Choice Easthampton Superintendent Candidate Withdraws After ‘Transphobic’ Facebook Posts Revealed

April 21, 2023

A candidate for Easthampton superintendent has removed herself from consideration after students, including one from the school’s Gender and Sexuality Alliance Club, found what they call “transphobic” posts on her Facebook page and provided them to Easthampton officials.

Erica Faginski-Stark’s withdrawal comes 10 days after the Easthampton School Committee voted to offer her the job and two weeks after a job offer to the first choice for the post was rescinded after he used “ladies” to refer to two women in an email message.

“With the recent anti trans picketing, many youth in the school are concerned and angry,” wrote the unnamed student, who emailed Easthampton Mayor Nicole LaChapelle with what the student called “extreme concerns.”

The two posts in question were published in January and March 2022, according to Boston.com.

On January 23, 2021, Faginski-Stark shared a PragerU article titled “The End of Women’s Sports,” which criticized the inclusion of biological males who identify as females in women’s sports.

Later, on March 21, 2021, she posted a petition calling for a defense of Title IX, a portion of a federal law that requires colleges to offer sports for females if they offer them for males. “Only girls should play girls’ sports,” the petition read. 

“Ladies, the glass ceiling is more real now than it’s been in generations. Our choice to use our voice or to remain silent will determine not only the future of women’s athletics but equality for women everywhere,” Stark wrote.

After being alerted to the posts, LaChapelle informed the school committee chairman Cynthia Kwiecinski, who subsequently told Faginski-Stark. Faginski-Stark then withdrew her candidacy.

The Easthampton School Committee plans to continue its rocky search for a new superintendent during a meeting scheduled for Tuesday, April 25.

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