A new complaint filed with the Department of Education accuses a Florida Panhandle school district of violating Title VI of the Civil Rights Act by ignoring years of antisemitic harassment against a Jewish student, including Nazi salutes performed in the classroom. 

The complaint, filed Thursday with the DOE’s Office for Civil Rights by the Anti-Defamation League and Akerman law firm, requests that the agency initiate an investigation into the Bay County School District over allegations that the student, who is currently in 11th grade, faced antisemitic discrimination consistently since elementary school.

Approximately 27,000 students are enrolled in Bay District K-12 public schools, which operates 49 schools. Bay County has one of the smallest Jewish communities in Florida, with fewer than 1,000 Jewish individuals.

The student — who is one of the only Jewish students in the district— is referred to throughout the complaint as “Student A.” He said he was forced to transfer out of A. Crawford Mosely High School mid-year as a result of the bullying and has suffered adverse mental health impacts and academic challenges. Before transfering, the student said he made the decision to hide his Star of David necklace, wearing it inside his shirt so it was not visible to classmates.  

Incidents alleged in the complaint, while the student was still enrolled at Mosley High School, included a group of students in a media studies class presenting two PowerPoint projects, in August and September 2025, which displayed antisemitic conspiracy theories portraying Jews as powerful, greedy, manipulative and in control of banks, the media and government. 

The students performed Sieg Heil salutes and mockingly wore yarmulkes while making the presentation. None of the student presenters were Jewish. The teachers present in the classroom did nothing to stop it, even as the presentations did not address the assignment, according to the complaint — which alleges that one teacher laughed during one of the presentations.  

The complaint alleges the district ignored repeated outreach from the student’s mother — a former 20-year employee of the district — who sought better inclusion of Jewish culture, including teaching the story of Hanukkah, following her son’s harassment.

“Bullying and harassment have persisted during Student A’s time enrolled in the district, but the district’s institutional neglect of Jewish students isolated Student A and left him to suffer in silence,” the complaint alleges. The district “knew, or should have reasonably known, that Student A was being isolated, singled out and excluded from school-wide holiday celebrations and other programs.”

The complaint suggests reforms the DOE could require the school district to adopt, including usage of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism — which is codified in Florida state law — and enforcement of a zero-tolerance policy for antisemitic conduct. It also suggests implementation of mandatory antisemitism training for all students, administrators, school board members, teachers, faculty and staff, and modification of programs to include Jews, such as revising the “Christmas Break” to read “Winter Break” on the academic calendar.

Neither the Bay School District nor the office of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis responded to requests for comment from Jewish Insider about the complaint.