Education

School Days

The Sodus, NY Central School District has decided to honor a request by a transgender student to use the girl's bathroom and locker room.

After a series of adults spoke against a transgender girl sharing facilities with their children, Jennifer Surridge stood up to speak. A hush fell over the proceedings.

 

 

 

 

My daughter has a civil right to be in the bathroom that she gender identifies with. And your children have the same right to be in the bathroom that they gender identify with. If they choose to leave that's a choice- my daughter is not choosing. She just is.

For years, since she was 3 or 4, she has told me she was a girl and I wasn't excepting. I didn't understand and agree with any of it because I didn't get it.

--Jennifer Surridge

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"Othering" the trans kids in Nevada

The Nevada Assembly Judiciary Committee went out of their way to resurrect and pass a bill which had been idle in the Education Committee for a month.

Disgraced former Speaker Elect Ira Hansen is Chair of the Judiciary Committee, which is dominated by conservative Republicans.

Hansen stepped down as incoming speaker last November after his history of racist and sexist writings was revealed.

Assembly Bill 375 will now go on to the full Assembly after passing on a party-line vote.

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Battle of the Bathroom at Boise South

 photo DW_zpsqu3gsxyk.jpgDW Trantham is a 13-year-old trans girl, a junior high school student at South Junior High School in Boise.

DW has fought for her rights as a transgender girl...including using a bathroom. When her school relented, citing a communication from the US Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, parents Pauline Adams and Jacob Smith withdrew their child from South.

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OK. Do let us think about the children

Everyone knows the right wing oratory. When it comes time to adress LGBT...especially T, rights, the religious conservatives are all, "Think about thew children!"

I do. All the f'ing time!

Let's think about some of the children whose stories I have recently run across, shall we?

Let's think about Tom Sosnik.

 

 

For a while, I dismissed the fact that I hated my body. I pretended to be content with what I was assigned until, at a certain point, I broke.

I went through a series of horrible breakdowns. And I would stand under the water in the shower crying. I knew I wasn't happy.

I am no longer Mia. I never really was. And now I finally stand before you in my true and authentic gender identity as Tom. I stand before you as a thirteen-year-old boy.

I really hope that you all will support my decision to embark on a harder route in life as the boy I truly am. Any form of support I receive with much gratitude and I hope that everyone can really support me because you guys are like my second family. And if you support me, I'll feel like the luckiest boy in the world. Thank you for letting me share my story.

In my heart, I am still the same person. Whether you like that person or not, it’s me.

--Tom

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Gender Prison: DoE issues Title IX guidelines on single-sex classes

Yesterday the Department of Education issued guidelines (36 pages) instructing schools which accept federal funding how to treat transgender students with regard to single-sex classes.

Although Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in federally funded education programs and activities, regulations issued by the Department authorize schools to offer single- sex classes or extracurricular activities under certain circumstances. In order to ensure that schools subject to Title IX comply with the Department’s requirements if they choose to offer single-sex classes and extracurricular activities, OCR provides the following responses to questions that schools should consider when assessing their compliance with Title IX. Although this document focuses on single-sex classes, some of the legal principles will also apply to single-sex schools. In order to gain a complete understanding of these legal requirements and recommendations, this document should be read in full.

--Catherine Lhamon, Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights

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Mills becomes first single-sex college to admit transgender students

Mills College in Oakland, CA has become the first single-sex institute of higher education to admit transgender students. Opened 162 years ago Mills will now welcome anyone who identifies as female into its all-women undergraduate program.

Mills is now the only one of the 119 single-sex colleges in the United States to have an official policy accepting transgender applicants. The new policy takes effect for the first time tomorrow, when the new semester starts.

The new policy allows for anyone who self-identifies as a woman to apply to the school, including trans women, people identified as female at birth but “do not fit into the gender binary," and women who have not yet legally transitioned to the male gender but may plan to at some point. Women who transition to male after enrolling may stay and graduate.

 

 

We were the first women’s college west of the Rockies. We were the first women’s college to have a computer science program. This is just another in many firsts.

--Mills President Alecia DeCoudreaux

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Louisville principal protects rights of transgender freshman

There was a problem at Atherton High School in Louisville, KY. As usual the cause of the problem was mostly identified as being a transgender student.

From the point of view of us transpeople, the problem is generally with those who cannot adapt to our existence and presence.

Principal Dr. Thomas Aberli had made a decision to allow a transgirl student to use one of the girls restrooms and girls locker rooms. According to reports this prompted complaints from parents and students. From past experience, I would hazard a guess that it was more parents than students with a problem.

On Thursday the school administration adopted a new non-discrimination policy which adds "gender identity" to the list of factors protected to the districtwide previous policy.

 

 

Advocates for the transgirl said the decision supported transgender students and were in line with the extension of Title IX protections to trans students by the DoE Office of Civil Rights.

Michael Aldridge of the Kentucky ACLU said the new policy "helps these students know their rights are protected."

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DOE Office of Civil Rights extends Title IX protections to transgender students

On my last day of actual teaching (only Finals Week to go before my retirement), I am proud to announce a major breakthrough in the rights of transgender and other gender-variant people on the federal level.

On Tuesday the Department of Educations Office of Civil Rights issued a letter barring all schools which receive Title IX funds from the Federal government from discriminating against gender-nonconforming students, entitled Questions and Answers on Title IX and Sexual Violence.

Title IX’s sex discrimination prohibition extends to claims of discrimination based on gender identity or failure to conform to stereotypical notions of masculinity or femininity and OCR accepts such complaints for investigation. Similarly, the actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity of the parties does not change a school’s obligations. Indeed, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) youth report high rates of sexual harassment and sexual violence. A school should investigate and resolve allegations of sexual violence regarding LGBT students using the same procedures and standards that it uses in all complaints involving sexual violence. The fact that incidents of sexual violence may be accompanied by anti-gay comments or be partly based on a student's actual or perceived sexual orientation does not relieve a school of its obligation under Title IX to investigate and remedy those instances of sexual violence.

If a school's policies related to sexual violence include examples of particular types of conduct that violate the school's prohibition on sexual violence, the school should consider including examples of same-sex conduct. In addition, a school should ensure that staff are capable of providing culturally competent counseling to all complainants.

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Teaching while transgender

Lumberton, TX Independent School District substitute teacher Laura Jane Klug has been suspended for being transgender. The school district says they are "looking into the matter"...and that Klug has not been terminated...yet. Klug is supposed to hear about the resolution of the school board today, after the school board met on Thursday.

Klug substituted for a teacher in a fifth grade class last Thursday, which was the first day she discovered that someone might have "issues".

Parents of some of the students at the school say, of course, that they don't have any problems themselves with the teacher being transgender, but that the teacher may be confusing the 11-year-olds who are in her charge.

Within an hour of them being exposed or dealing with this, there's a few issues here, I think these kids are too young for this issue, so that's our main focus is, if it happens in older grades, high school, ok but too young for this.

--Roger Bread, parent

Other parents say there has not been an issue before with Klug and they don't see why it is an issue now...and that they have no problem explaining to their child what a transgendender person is.

My son knows who he is and I don't think any outside influence is going to change that, I'm more concerned about straight predatory teachers rather than I am someone who lives an alternative private alternate lifestyle, I don't worry about my son.

--Jammie Marcantel, parent

Texas, of course, has no employment protections for transgender people.

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Policing Gender

Sunnie Kahle, 8, prefers to have short hair and dress comfortably (t-shirts, jeans and sneakers). Officials at the school she has attended, Timberlake Christian School near Lynchburg, VA, decided that wasn't appropriate for one of their students. So they wrote to Sunnie's grandparents, who are also her guardians, to inform them that Sunnie would have to dress more femininely if she wanted to attend that school.

Despite what you may see in any headlines, Sunnie is not transgender. She is perfectly satisfied with being a girl.

The school officials, however, expressed their concern about her appearance and cited their policy against condoning sexual immorality, practicing a homosexual lifestyle, or having an alternative gender identity.

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