Complaints about a politically divisive curriculum taught by a Spanish Fort high school government instructor continued to surface before the Baldwin County School Board on Thursday.

The latest concerns, expressed during the board's monthly meeting in Bay Minette, focused on classroom instruction that allegedly included comparisons of President Barack Obama to Adolf Hitler and criticism about government social welfare programs leading to "the nation's downfall."

Others claimed the AP Government class taught by Gene Ponder involves outdated materials and blogs to back up political claims, and utilizes non-scientific reasoning on issues such as gun control.

"This is not a small group of students misinterpreting or challenging a viewpoint," said Julia Coccaro, the high school student who first raised concerns about Ponder's choice of right-wing authors and celebrities in a summer reading list last year. That same list was pulled by the school system in June.

"The taxpayers of Baldwin County are not paying for their children to be indoctrinated," said Coccaro, who is the chairwoman of the Alabama High School Democrats. "They are paying to be educated and we are not being educated in that classroom."

A host of former educators, parents and concerned citizens also spoke out against Ponder, who attended the meeting but did not speak. Ponder also declined to comment after the meeting was over.

"Unfortunately, our political conversations have gotten course and divisive," said Linda Tom, a Fairhope resident. "There is no room for that inside our classrooms and it should not be allowed inside our classrooms."

Said Sandra Page, a retired Fairhope high school educator: "We are teaching hate in our school systems."

'Cope and address'

Baldwin County School Board members and Superintendent Eddie Tyler also remained quiet during the public commenting session.

And individual school board members also did not address the comments.

Instead, the board spent most of their time praising Tyler for the work he has done in helping Baldwin County schools move beyond a host of hurdles such as building new schools at a time of soaring growth and limited resources.

Tyler's superintendent contract runs until June, but all of the board members said they would like to see him remain with the school system.

Talks are expected to begin about a contract extension for another three years, as well as a pay raise beyond Tyler's current $160,000 annual salary. By comparison, the superintendents at the only two schools systems in Alabama larger than Baldwin County - Mobile County and Jefferson County - pay their superintendents substantially more.

Tyler, after the board meeting, told AL.com that he appreciated the public's comments and concerns about Ponder. Though no one said Ponder by name, Tyler said he felt some of the speakers "engaged in character assassination with no solid justifiable knowledge" to back up their concerns.

"We have to learn to cope and address these issues in a mature and meaningful way and not coming from an angle of 'everyone says your guilty because we say you are,'" Tyler said.

But Tyler said the school system will take some of the public's suggestions "under consideration." Among the recommendations was to have an academic supervisor in place to review lesson plans.

"The lesson plans I examined appear to be totally extracurricular," said Cynthia McMeans, a retired teacher. "No teaching materials based on a legitimate course of study in the social sciences would rely on and include information from websites, blogs, articles and interviews found on conspiracy theories and logical fallacies. None of the lesson plans come from reputable sources."

Ponder did have his defenders. One of them was Eugene Maye of Fairhope, who personally attended one of his classroom sessions.

"I was looking for something to tell me that this teacher was bias and I didn't hear it or see it," said Maye. "We want to believe our kids. But my take from that class is that I didn't see anything wrong."

'Corrective measures'

While Ponder's class drew the most attention, other past divisive issues affecting Baldwin County also come up. Among them included exposing LGBT students to teachers who "espouse homophobia," and a perceived lack of diversity training in the aftermath of a racist and vulgar cell phone video that surfaced from Spanish Fort last year.

Coccaro lumped most of those concerns in a complaint that was filed with the school system last summer.

The complaint included detailed accusations about censorship of the school's yearbook related to a mentioning of a student "coming out of the closet," a driver's education teacher spending an entire class period discussing his religious beliefs, as well as Tyler's past position on the summer reading list.

The school system wrapped up its investigation last month and forwarded at two-page response to Coccaro on Dec. 22. The school system acknowledged to hiring outside investigators including former FBI agents to handle the complaint.

"Although complaints are not routinely handled in this manner, from time to time the board elects to engage outside experts to conduct investigations," Tyler wrote.

Tyler, in the letter, said the school's curriculum department will review and revise summer reading lists and assignments. Ponder, last year, had his controversial summer reading list pulled not because of the content from the right-wing authors on it, but because he did not follow the school's policies.

Tyler also said there will be additional guidance provided to yearbook faculty regarding First Amendment issues. He said the guidance will be applicable county wide.

But Tyler also said that the school system couldn't corroborate Coccaro's other complaints, such as allegations of religious harassment.

Coccaro thanked the school for looking into her complaint, but said she was disappointed that they could not corroborate "every issue." It was her first time before the board since August.

But Coccaro's main problem, on Thursday, was Ponder's class.

"No corrective measures have been made," she said. "If you continue to be complicit in this, I do not believe you are concerned about the education and well-being of the Baldwin County School System. The issue does not end at this board meeting or with my departure from the school system."