HOUSTON — A claim made by the father of a Houston Independent School District student has prompted a statewide response.
Gov. Greg Abbott tweeted about the claim made by Sadrach Terwogt at an HISD board meeting last week. In the tweet, Abbott ordered the Texas Education Agency to investigate what happened.
Terwogt is a roofer and a single parent of two children. He claims that an HISD teacher brought his son to a drag show in February 2019. He said his son was underage at the time and he didn't provide consent for him to go.
"He also took my son to a drag show when he was underage. It was really bad. It was a really bad experience," Terwogt said.
Terwogt said he feels like HISD didn't do anything about the incident and recently felt encouraged by other parents to speak about what happened.
He said his son was 16 when his teacher took him to record the show at a club.
"We are supposed to trust teachers," Terwogt said.
Terwogt said his son initially told him that he was going to record a food contest. He said he even texted his son to check on him. He said his son told him that they were still recording and he was safe.
He said his son recorded videos of his teacher driving him to the club. In the videos, you can see them enter the club through the back door. The video shows them going behind the scenes and recording the drag show.
Terwogt said his son got home at 3 a.m. that night. The father said he went to his school the next day to get answers.
"Then, they told me the principal was there and two detectives and my son," he said. "(They asked) 'Did you know your son was at a drag show?' And I was, like, 'no.'"
Terwogt said HISD didn't do anything about the incident.
"I would go to every room and they will tell me we cannot talk about it. Who do I have to talk about it?" he said.
Now that it has caught the attention of Abbott, Terwogt hopes something is done.
"The TEA needs to know how they are handling the things right here. Because if they don’t do anything here, nobody knows," he said.
Terwogt asked the school for text message records because he feels like something inappropriate was going on between his son and the teacher.
"We tried to resolve it with therapy, but then when I start seeing or hearing comments, yeah, I believe there is something," he said.
The TEA said it received a complaint related to HISD and that complaint is currently under jurisdictional review.
Terwogt said neither Abbott nor his office has reached out to discuss the incident.
HISD issued this statement:
"The viral video making the rounds on social media references an incident from 2019. Houston ISD was made aware of allegations of teacher misconduct and launched an investigation in 2019. The teacher has not worked for HISD since April 2019. Because of laws requiring confidentiality in educator employment records, we are unable to release any further information."
The TEA issued this statement:
"The Texas Education Agency has received a complaint related to Houston ISD. The complaint is currently under jurisdictional review. No further info available at this time."