A California school board meeting turned contentious last month after a board vice president said she was “personally offended” by a staff presentation that referred to certain students as “homeless,” calling instead for the term “unhoused” to be used, as reported by Fox News.

The exchange occurred during a Jan. 14 meeting of the Pajaro Valley Unified School District board. Vice President Joy Flynn made the remarks following a presentation by Assistant Superintendent of Educational Services Michael Berman.

Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board Vice President Joy Flynn school board member 'personally offended' when speaker says 'homeless' instead of 'unhoused' I'm personally offended people like this are on school boards! Vote Joy Flynn out!https://t.co/xUoUIr2z45

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Berman had delivered a “Report on Student Achievement” using data from the California School Dashboard, which tracks district performance across multiple categories, including graduation rates, chronic absenteeism, suspension levels, foster youth, students with disabilities, and students identified as homeless.

After the public comment period concluded, Flynn addressed the board and said she took issue with the language used in the presentation.

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“I have a lot to say, and I will speak plainly. And you may not like it. I am personally offended by what was presented. On so many different levels,” Flynn said.

She then focused on the terminology used to describe students without stable housing.

“One thing I would like to see updated is the word homeless to unhoused,” Flynn said.

Another board member interrupted, noting that the term “homeless” is the language used by the state of California in its reporting requirements.

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“I’m not done,” Flynn responded.

The board member continued, defending the staff and saying, “I just don’t want Mr. Berman … for this to be on him. That’s the way our state of California, that’s the language that they use. And that’s their reporting.”

“That doesn’t mean that’s the language we have to use,” Flynn replied.

Flynn said she understood the data was drawn from state sources but insisted the district should adopt different terminology.

“I’m just making a statement, and I’d like to have my time to finish,” she said. “I recognize that you’re using the information that was given to you, that you researched, and I’m asking that it be updated.”

“And it is just because that’s the way that everybody else does it, doesn’t mean that’s the way we need to do it. It’s a respectful term to speak about our community,” Flynn added.

Flynn also objected to portions of the presentation discussing Black students in the district.

During his report, Berman highlighted that Black and African-American students were the only demographic group marked in red, indicating a “very high” suspension rate.

“One thing I want to call out is we see only one group in red, and it’s our Black and African-American students. This is a big problem,” Berman said.

“You may have noticed that this is the first time we’ve seen our Black students in any of these indicators.”

Berman explained that Black students make up less than 1% of the district’s population, which is more than 85% Hispanic and about 13% White.

He said there were not enough Black students to be considered “statistically significant” in other state indicators such as graduation rates and college and career readiness.

“We have a lot of work to do, and this data point is significant,” Berman said.

Flynn pushed back on that explanation.

“I recognize that in this report that I think that something was said that there aren’t enough Black students to have statistical significance. I’m personally offended by that,” she said.

“If we have one Black student, that student is statistically significant enough to be on the report.”

Neither Flynn nor Pajaro Valley Unified School District responded to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.

The comments drew a response from the North American Values Institute, which monitors education policy nationwide.

“Changing language that functions to help us understand urgency and truth—in order to reduce stigma, cater to feelings, and be ‘politically correct’—is a dangerous path,” a spokesperson said.

“In the case of K-12, it could inadvertently lead to decisions that direct resources or interventions away from the students who need them most.”

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