Student activist Michael Knowlton.

A few days ago, Knox, Indiana, high school student Michael Knowlton decided he’d had enough of what he saw as his school’s discrimination against LGBT students. In hopes of getting Knox High School to allow same-sex couples to attend an upcoming dance, he created a Facebook page, “Equality at KHS“, with his friend Julian Williams. Within 48 hours, it had gained enough likes to represent almost half of the entire student body, and kids all across town got involved, wearing red shirts to school on Monday in a show of solidarity.

After a conversation with the principal, Elizabeth Ratliff, Knowlton apologized on the Facebook page. His written apology denounced talk of discrimination as an attempt to “publicly humiliate” the school. Students quickly retaliated with public comments of their own, noting that no same-sex couple has ever been allowed to attend prom, that the KHS faculty had actually announced the policy over the school’s intercom and that even friends of same-sex couples had been turned away when attempting to buy tickets for them.

One student claims to have started filing a complaint with the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana. For now, the high school faculty has asked students to “keep the peace” in return for a promise that LGBT couples won’t be barred from the next school dance. Students appear skeptical and determined. “Even if they have done wrong in the past,” Knowlton wrote on the Facebook page, “they will not do so in the future. If they oppose, this page will be waiting.”