Fremont-Mills Students Stage Walkout To Protest School Board Actions

A student-led walkout at Fremont-Mills School Friday put a spotlight on growing concerns over the school board’s recent decisions, including a vote to not hire a transgender teacher and questions about whether the board’s actions align with district policy and its responsibility to provide an inclusive school environment.

More than 20 students walked out of the school’s main doors a little after 9 a.m. Friday morning before proceeding to the football field where they congregated for over an hour in protest. Some sat chatting and others doing homework. Some of the students carried signs. One read “Lead by Example.” Another read “Stick to Your Own Policies…102,” referring to the district’s own equal educational opportunity and nondiscrimination policy.

The protest comes a month after the board’s controversial decision to reject the contract offer the district made to Ace Rios to become the high school music and band teacher in early August for the 2026-2027 school year.
Rios, who identifies as a transgender male, had already been issued key card access and was in the midst of setting up his classroom just days before the start of school when informed his employment would not be moving forward.

The board hit another snag at its September meeting last Wednesday, just two days before the walkout, when it was stalemated on filling a seat vacated by the resignation of Wes Hill.
Scott Kesterson, Hannah Graham, Rachel Schean and Lacey Wake all applied for the seat and had their chance to speak at the meeting as to why they would be a good fit on the board, but none garnered the requisite three votes for appointment.

The board had until Sunday to appoint a new member. The district will now hold a special school board election to fill that seat.

Iowa code requires a special election be on a Tuesday but not within four weeks before or four weeks after a general election which means December is likely the earliest that vote would take place.

Wyatt Lemonds, a senior at Fremont-Mills, was one of the students that took part in the walkout. He attended the August board meeting and was part of a large group of students at the meeting last week as part of a government class assignment.

Lemonds said he and most of the students he talked to following the meeting were not happy with the board’s decisions dating back to August. The walkout idea sprang from that dissatisfaction.

“Me and many in my class did not like how two of the board members were voting on certain issues, not just in this meeting but also in August,” he said.

When asked who those two board members were, Lemonds listed board president Eli Forney and Shannon Smith. Both voted no on the Rios hiring in August. Board members Jennifer Wyant and Mary Beth Korver both voted in favor of the hiring.

“I think that (vote) sent the wrong message to the community and our (senior) class that has one of the highest levels of LGBTQ+ members in it,” he said. “We didn’t feel like the board was representing us.”

Lemonds said nearly 30 students took part in the protest, all of them high school students. Many of the students also emailed members of the board to express their concerns.

“We asked them (board members) why they voted certain ways to see if they would respond and let us know answers to questions we had,” Lemonds said.
Just one board member, Jennifer Wyant, has so far replied to the students emails, Lemonds said.

“In my email and many others, we didn’t discuss the Ace Rios decision. We talked about an absence of leadership and key points of transparency that the board hasn’t shown,” he said.

The district was aware of the protest prior to Friday.

Fremont-Mills Community School District secondary principal Dr. Corey Erps sent a letter to parents the day before the walkout saying the “district respects our students’ rights as Americans to express their views and to participate in peaceful, non-violent protest. We recognize that current events can inspire students to want to make their voices heard, and we support their right to do so.”

The letter went on to say that students participating in the walkout protest during school hours could be held accountable in accordance with district conduct policy which could include being marked absent or tardy for missed class time and “other consequences outlined in the student handbook.

According to the school’s conduct policy, “unexcused absences” or “truancy” can lead to disciplinary actions that include suspension and expulsion.
In an email sent Monday morning, Fremont-Mills Superintendent Dave Gute said students participating in the protest would face no disciplinary consequence but that the lost time would count toward the students’ total absences.

Since the Aug. 19 vote of the five-member school board that ended in a 2-2 tie meaning Rios would not be formally hired, the district has been quiet as the controversy has only gained in media attention.

The same day as that vote, a report was filed with the Fremont County Sheriff’s Office that a threat was made against a school board member. That board member was later identified as Wes Hill.

According to the complaint, Hill received a phone call from a blocked number in which the caller told him to vote a certain way during that night’s meeting or face consequences, including a threat of violence.

Hill abstained from the vote that night and later resigned from his seat on the board.

On Aug. 28, Eric Ballanger, 52, of Russell, a town 144 miles from Tabor, was arrested without incident for allegedly making that call. The investigation revealed Russell also unsuccessfully attempted to contact a second board member.

Ballanger was charged with threat of terrorism, a Class D felony. He later posted bail and was released from custody.

It is unknown what connections, if any, Ballanger has to the Fremont-Mills Community School district or the Tabor community.

Rios, according to published reports, has said he believes his gender identity was the reason he was denied the job and he is considering legal action.

Rios has declined interview requests from The Opinion-Tribune.

While discrimination in hiring based on sexual orientation remains illegal in Iowa under state and federal law, “gender identity” was removed as a protected class in the state’s civil rights code in 2025. Transgender and nonbinary workers, however, remain protected under the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Gute, the Fremont-Mills superintendent, did confirm a substitute has been filling in as the high school music and band teacher – the position Rios was originally hired for –since the start of the school year.

Cody James has followed the board’s decision closely since August and has posted several videos on social media critical of the board. While he lives in Atlantic, his daughter Tayleigh attends Fremont-Mills. She was one of the students who participated in Friday’s protest.

“With the Ace Rios deal, I’ve said from the beginning that I wasn’t here to tell people who they needed to hire,” James said. “What I was telling people was that just because somebody looks different doesn’t mean that they’re not qualified for a job. I have spent a lot of time traveling and I’ve met a lot of people who look very, very weird and most of them are very, very creative folks. And they’re all usually pretty good people.”

Prior to the protest, James discussed the repercussions his daughter might face in school for walking out.

“I said, ‘Hey, that’s part of it. Nothing in the world that’s worth it is easy.’ That’s what I tell my kids all the time. If you’re going to go out and fight for something, you have to be willing to take the consequences.  The consequences come with the goals and the actions that you take to reach those goals.

Lemonds admits support for Rios is divided in the community but he hopes the protest and the emails will lead to a future conversation between the students and the board where they both can discuss “not just what the community might want but also the students.”

“One of the core beliefs of this school is that the learning process shares responsibility with family, school and community members,” Lemonds said. “I think that leadership, or their leadership in how they handled certain issues, through the school board and the community, was not a good representation of leadership.”

NOTE - Editor Joe Foreman contributed to this article.