> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.classicalfamiliesforum.org/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Kootenai Classical Academy: REPORT, PART 1 - URL: https://www.classicalfamiliesforum.org/coming-soon/ - Published: 2026-10-03T15:10:34.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-04T20:47:06.000Z - Author: Jonathan Mayshar - Tags: News This report can be shared with this link: ## Contents 1. Introduction 2. Classical Families Forum and structural bias disclosure 3. The investigation, and the Board 3a. Emily Williams letter 3b. Four teachers letter 3c. Alexandra Miller letter 3d. Francesca Klefsky letter 3e. Rachel Kaitz letter 4. Idaho law on curriculum informed consent 4a. P.E. sessions email 4b. Retroactive permission template 4c. Informed consent grievance template 5. It’s not about the investigative file 6. Coming in Part 2 of our report 7. Contacting us ## Introduction In January and February 2026, KCA Operations Manager Conrad Woodall taught sessions billed as “self-defense and personal safety” during regular physical-education periods. Girls and boys were separated. Athletic Director Jesse Lindenstein sent parents an email in advance. It named topics such as bullying and peer pressure. It did not name sexual assault or rape. Letters from former Dean of Faculty Emily Williams and from four KCA teachers state that those sessions did address sexual assault and rape, and that Mr. Woodall used his own body as the “attacker,” with adolescent girls as defenders. Title IX sexual-harassment complaints followed. We have not seen the complaints or the determination. In a September 14 meeting with parents, including one of the editors of this report, Dr. Jill Hettinger and Mr. Woodall said a panel of three Title IX attorneys hired by the school issued a determination on September 8: Mr. Woodall had “no responsibility,” and the panel made “no recommendations.” We have also been told that retaliation complaints were made while that process was open. Title IX covers retaliation for Title IX complaints. We do not know whether those allegations were inside the panel’s charge. Idaho Code §§ 33-1609 and 33-1611A require, before human-sexuality instruction — including instruction on sexual violence — two weeks’ notice that describes the content, a chance to review materials, and a signed parent permission form on file with the board. Default attendance is not allowed. The Lindenstein email and the PE unit as taught did not meet those requirements. That is a separate question from whether Mr. Woodall violated Title IX. On September 14, Dr. Hettinger and Mr. Woodall said further questions about consent were out of bounds because of the determination. Dr. Hettinger compared those questions to re-prosecuting a man who had been found innocent. We asked the school, under the Public Records Act, for the panel’s engagement letter and scope of work. The school missed the three-working-day deadline in Idaho Code § 74-103\. On working day five it pointed us to the Governance page of its website, which contained no responsive documents. We have sent a follow-up. We are not holding this report for a better answer. ## Classical Families Forum and structural bias disclosure Classical Families Forum is a community organization and a digital news outlet. This report is both. We started as KCA parents writing other KCA parents. We formed CFF because the same problems — school accountability, public records, parent and teacher rights — are not only a KCA story. We are current and former KCA parents. Some of us left for reasons that overlap what follows. That is a structural bias, and we are disclosing it. The facts in this installment come from documents, signed letters, Idaho statutes, and a September 14 meeting one of the editors attended. We take the side of parent-notice law and of public records transparency. We do not claim to be neutral on these issues. More about CFF, and the other stories in this first issue, is here: [About Classical Families Forum](https://www.classicalfamiliesforum.org/about/). If you received this as an email and want off the list, reply “remove.” ## The investigation, and the Board We have not seen the Title IX complaints or the determination file. The school, as the recipient, is limited in what it may say. Mr. Woodall, as the respondent, may describe what happened to him if he does not identify students or witnesses. What is already public is in signed letters. ### Emily Williams letter Former Dean of Faculty Emily Williams wrote Jared Dawson, program manager at the Idaho Public Charter School Commission. The portion that concerns the PE sessions and the investigation is section 2 of her letter: Emily Williams letter (PDF). ### Four teachers letter Four teachers — Melissa Espinoza, Francesca Klefsky, Terryl Liimakka (also the mother of CFF co-editor Mikyl Swoboda), and Alexandra Miller — wrote the board. They asked that Mr. Woodall be placed on leave pending an investigation, that parents of the girls in those PE sections be informed, and that the investigation be independent. He was not placed on leave. Those parents were not informed as a group. The four teachers also wrote: “This pattern of behavior has created an environment that many female students and staff experience as intimidating and hostile, raising the significant risk of Title IX liability for sex-based harassment and bullying.” Their letter is here: Four teachers letter (PDF). Of the four teachers, only Espinoza is still at KCA. Miller and Klefsky later provided open letters at our request. ### Alexandra Miller letter Alexandra Miller taught literature and grammar at KCA. In her letter she says she reported, in April 2026, two things: that 9th- and 10th-grade girls were put through sexual-assault training in required PE without informed parental consent, and that the school still had not told those families after a Title IX investigation had begun. She writes that Woodall stayed in his job, that her request to notify families was denied, and that basic interim safety measures she asked for were denied. She later left. She and her husband, she writes, will not keep their children enrolled under this board. The letter is here: Alexandra Miller letter (PDF). ### Francesca Klefsky letter Francesca Klefsky taught PE and math, and coached track and cross-country. On September 8, after leaving KCA, she wrote that a student-safety concern about the “self-defense” sessions in 9th- and 10th-grade PE was raised to her, that she took it up the chain, and that she believed Kaitz, Williams, and Hansen took it seriously. She says the board and the Title IX coordinator then told staff not to discuss it and to send parent questions to them. Parents, she writes, were not told what had happened in the class and could not make the informed decisions she could make as both teacher and parent. She left after the new headmaster first said there were no PE classes for her, then offered subjects that did not match the Intent to Return she had signed in April. Her letter is here: Francesca Klefsky letter (PDF). Emily Williams’ letter refers to board interference in a Title IX process that should have, according to school written policy, been led by Headmaster Kaitz. Another departure is in an email that Title IX Coordinator Jackie Wernz wrote to a parent (now one of our editors): “Please also note that I was not hired by, and do not report to, the Interim Headmaster.” Under KCA’s written policies, interim Headmaster Krystal Hansen should have been the direct report for the Title IX Coordinator. Before she left, Mrs. Hansen told two of us — now this report’s editors — she wanted to tell the 9th- and 10th-grade families more and was being prevented from doing so. The school’s policies do not have a provision for the board taking such decisions from the Headmaster. We asked the board why the written structure was set aside in the case of Wernz’s reporting structure. Director Robby Miles wrote: > “Though the school has policies that describe its organizational structure, it does not mean that those policies prohibit any flexibility in rare circumstances. These situations are very few and far between and are entered into after careful consideration and consultation with legal counsel and trusted consultants.” ### Rachel Kaitz letter Founding board member Rachel Kaitz, in a letter asking the whole board to step aside, described other breaks with the school’s written policy. She wrote that the board’s “active collusion with members of the staff created unhealthy and toxic factions that are unlikely to be repaired with this present board in place.” Her letter is here: Rachel Kaitz letter (PDF). The remaining sections of Williams’ letter go to the same pattern. Williams wrote, “There is clear evidence of a backchannel between individual members of the Board and the Director of Operations and possibly other KCA employees. There is documentation of videos, text messages, and emails that clearly show certain members of the school community having knowledge of Board activity and decisions that neither the School Leader nor the general public knew. Additionally, there is evidence that the Board has favored the Director of Operations despite his documented unprofessionalism and safety concerns, and have made unreasonable and unethical decisions at the request of the Director of Operations and certain employees at the school.” Emily Williams letter (PDF). The board has not published a rule for when it may suspend the school’s other written rules. Whether those exceptions are “few and far between” is a question the letters raise. ## Idaho law on curriculum informed consent Idaho public schools are not required to teach human sexuality. If they do, Idaho Code §§ 33-1609 and 33-1611A require a specific parental permission process. “Human sexuality” includes sexual conduct, sexual abuse, and sexual violence. This is in the Idaho statutory definition. A PE unit that addresses rape and sexual assault is instruction on those topics. Calling it self-defense or personal safety does not change the subject matter. Neither does using an administrator as a guest instructor. The statute applies to regular staff and guests alike. Before any child may attend that instruction, the school must: - notify parents of eligible students at least two weeks before the first session; - include a brief description of the human-sexuality content; - let parents review the materials that will be used; - refuse attendance unless the parent files a signed permission form with the board of trustees within one week of the start of the instruction; and - give any child without a form alternative instruction that still counts toward the grade or graduation requirement and that does not address human sexuality. Default attendance is not allowed. An email telling parents to contact the instructor or the PE teacher if they object is not a signed form to the board. A description that omits rape and sexual assault is not a description of the content. An offer of “alternative arrangements,” with no materials to review, is not the review and alternative the statute requires. If all of these had been present, the email would still fail the statutory requirements on five days’ notice rather than two weeks’ notice. If a child receives the instruction without that parent-signed release, the parent may give written notice to the board, and may grant retroactive permission or demand rectification. The board has thirty days. It must have procedures to investigate a reported violation. An employee found to have broken the rule may be disciplined. If the board fails to provide adequate rectification, the parent has a cause of action against the board after other remedies are exhausted, and may seek actual damages and injunctive relief. Kootenai Classical Academy taught this unit in PE in January and February 2026\. The content included rape and sexual assault. The school was therefore required to treat it as human-sexuality instruction: two weeks’ notice that named that content, materials available for review, a signed form on file with the board before the child attended, and real alternative PE for anyone without a form. Delivering the unit as ordinary PE, without that process, is a violation of § 33-1611A. Idaho Code § 33-6001 runs alongside that rule. Parents must be able to learn the course of study, review learning materials, and withdraw a child from an activity that harms the child or impairs firmly held beliefs. If a complaint is not satisfactorily remedied, the parent has a private cause of action. That statute does not replace the human-sexuality permission requirement. It is a second duty the school also had when it put sexual-violence instruction in PE. ### P.E. sessions email Below is the email provided to parents by Athletic Director Jesse Lindenstein on Jan. 21. Lindenstein email, Jan. 21 (PDF) ### Retroactive permission template Below are two templates we have created that KCA parents may find useful. One is for giving KCA retroactive permission. The other is for filing a grievance. It is important to note with respect to the grievance that the laws invoked do not require the parent to show harm to the child. The harm here is to the parent’s right to informed consent under Idaho law. Retroactive permission template (PDF) ### Informed consent grievance template Informed consent grievance template (PDF) Parents who want to use the statutory notice, and who would rather not be the only name on the first letter, may say so on our contact form. We will not publish those names. We will not send anyone a list of other parents. If more than one family asks, we will tell each of them that others have asked. Anyone who then wants to be put in touch can say so, and we will ask the others before any introduction. No introduction happens without both sides agreeing. ## It’s not about the investigative file Dr. Hettinger told our editors, then as parents, on August 12 that she wanted the Title IX investigation finished before school started and before teachers returned on August 24\. She said that gave the Title IX Coordinator a “timeline,” and told her to “make it happen.” A headmaster may want a file closed, but a calendar order to the coordinator is pressure on a process the school is required to run without directing the outcome. The investigative file is what Title IX privacy covers: the identities of complaining students, and Mr. Woodall’s identity as respondent until he chose to discuss the determination. Classroom events are not the file. Dozens of students were in those PE periods. The school may say what the unit was. It may say whether Idaho’s permission statute was followed. It could have told every parent. It could still tell the parents of the students who were in the sessions. On August 12, before the determination letter, Dr. Hettinger said there should have been an opt-in. On September 14, after the letter, she and Mr. Woodall said questions about consent were out of bounds because the matter had been adjudicated — in a document only he could release. We do not know whether that letter addressed Idaho Code § 33-1611A. A parent who files the informed consent grievance may find out. ## Coming in Part 2 of our report We are still reporting. Part 2 will take up retaliation claims that we cannot yet place inside or outside the September 8 determination, the school’s handling of public-records requests, including the Title IX panel engagement, and financial questions related to documents we are still reviewing. ## Contacting us Jonathan Mayshar and Mikyl Swoboda edited this report. Others in the group reported and advised. Contact form: contact form. The form is able to take attachments if you have documents to share. If you have a personal email for one of us, please use the contact form instead. We work as a team. About CFF and the other stories in this issue: [About Classical Families Forum](https://www.classicalfamiliesforum.org/about/). We hope to hear from you, and we are looking for new contributors. The above complete Report, Part 1 was submitted to Conrad Woodall, Jill Hettinger, and the KCA board before noon on Wednesday Sept. 23, offering them the opportunity to comment until Friday at noon, Sept. 25\. No comment had been received by the end of that 48-hour+ clock.