Pass python/django variable into javascript as JSON?

Woking on personal project website with django 1.9 and python 3.4. I am using FullCalendar. The idea is to pass a set of appointment objects into the html page containing the javascript for the calendar. But right now, I am just trying to pass a single default appointment.

In views.py I have the following:

appt = json.dumps({ "title": "meeting", "start": "2016-11-20"});

return render(request, 'healthnet/profile_patient.html', {'patient': patient, 'appt': appt_set})

In profile_patient.html:

<script>



    var data = jQuery.parseJSON("{{appt}}");



    var events;

    events = [];

    events.push(data);





    $(document).ready(function() {



        $('#calendar').fullCalendar({

            editable: true,

            eventLimit: true, // allow "more" link when too many events

            events: events

        });

    });

</script>

is not getting properly parsed I believe. When the web page is loaded, the calendar does not display at all.

When I substitute with the direct string, it does work:

var data = jQuery.parseJSON('{"title": "meeting", "start": "2016-11-20"}');

When I call I get the following:
enter image description here

So there's something wrong with the way I'm using ths varibale. Any ideas?