The Boston Public Schools superintendent has resigned after a civil rights group sued his district for allegedly providing a student's information to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Tommy Chang announced he would quit last week, two years before his contract was set to expire and one day after the lawsuit was filed. He did not specify the reasons for his resignation.

The lawsuit – filed by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Economic Justice and a coalition of students’ rights groups – accuses the district of sharing information about a “school incident” with the federal immigration agency.

That information was then sent to a network of local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies and used as evidence against the student in deportation proceedings, according to the suit.

In a letter to the Boston Public Schools (BPS) community Mr Chang said the district had never shared information about a student’s immigration status with ICE "unless required under law.”

Mr Chang added: “It would be against BPS policy to provide any student records to ICE, and BPS does not have a practice of doing so.”

The lawsuit, according to Mr Chang, focuses on an incident in which the school district assisted the Boston Police Department and Massachusetts State Police – among other law enforcement agencies – in their investigation of gang-related murders in Boston more than two years ago.

'You belong at the back of that cage': Incidents of hate inside U.S. immigration detention

The district provided “relevant school police reports” to aid in that investigation, Mr Chang said, but did not reveal any student immigration information.

But Matt Cregor, an attorney for the Lawyers’ Committee, said the issue was not with sharing students' immigration statuses, but with district's handling of students' information.

The Lawyer's Committee, he said, was suing in order to “know the difference between who is being referred to the principal's office, and who is being referred to ICE”.

Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Show all 14 1 /14 Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Immigrant children, many of whom are separated form their parents, are housed in Texas' tent city Reuters Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border A two-year-old Honduran asylum seeker cries as her mother is searched and detained near the US-Mexico border Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Undocumented migrants ride on the top of a freight train referred to as the beast, or La Bestia Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border A cage inside a US Customs and Border Protection detention facility in Texas Reuters Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border US Border Patrol Academy All new agents must complete a months-long training course at the New Mexico facility before assuming their posts at Border Patrol stations, mostly along the US-Mexico border Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border US-Mexico border fence A group of young men walk along the Mexican side of the US-Mexico border fence in a remote area of the Sonoran Desert Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border US-Mexico border fence in the US Man looks through US-Mexico border fence into the US in Tijuana, Mexico Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border US-Mexico border fence US Border Patrol agent Sal De Leon stands near a section of the US-Mexico border fence while stopping on patrol on in La Joya, Texas Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border US Border Patrol Academy US Border Patrol instructor yells at trainees after their initial arrival to the academy Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Memorial service in Guatemala Families attend a memorial service for two boys who were kidnapped and killed in San Juan Sacatepequez, Guatemala. Crime drives emigration from Guatemala to the United States, as families seek refuge from the danger Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Arrests on the border Undocumented immigrants comfort each other after being caught by Border Patrol agents near the US-Mexico border Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Detention holding facility A boy from Honduras watches a movie at a detention facility run by the US Border Patrol Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Mexican farm workers Mexican migrant workers harvest organic parsley at Grant Family Farms in Wellington, Colorado Getty Undocumented immigration across the US-Mexico border Mexican family in Arizona A Mexican immigrant family sits in the living room of their rented home in Tuscon, Arizona. The family that Arizona's new tough immigrant law had created a climate of fear in the immigrant community. Getty

He added that the committee had originally filed a public records request for information on what data the school district was submitting to BRIC. They filed their lawsuit only when that request was denied.

But the organisation also denied advocating for Mr Chang’s removal, saying in a statement it was the City of Boston’s policies and practices that were at issue – not the actions of a single administrator.

Boston Mayor Marty Walsh said in a statement that Mr Chang’s resignation was a mutual decision, but did not comment on the lawsuit against the district. A spokesperson for the superintendent's office declined to comment on the record.

Mr Chang took over as BPS superintendent in 2015, after working in the Los Angeles Unified School District. He was awarded a five-year contract – the longest of any in the country for the head of a large urban district, according to the BPS website. But his two-and-a-half-year tenure was marred by controversy, on everything from earlier school start times to a scathing IRS audit of the district.

In a letter announcing his resignation, Mr Chang remarked on his journey from a young Taiwanese immigrant to the leader of a major public school system.