U.S. Education and Justice departments enforce against school districts for gender identity policies

Anne Arundel, Ann Arbor schools face federal enforcement action

In a press release issued Monday, the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice said they are taking “significant action” against two public school districts that have policies allowing employees to withhold a student’s personal gender identity from their parents. The departments cited parental rights under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and alleged the schools were “hiding sensitive information about children’s health well-being from their own parents.”

The Department of Education’s Student Privacy Policy Office received complaints from parents in Maryland who said Anne Arundel County Public Schools was helping their child “pretend to be male,” according to the release. The release said the principal declined to give the parents information about their student and the assistant principal refused to turn over records. The departments said the SPPO and the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division will start applicable judicial proceedings and that the district may face the loss of federal funding.

In Michigan, the release said, SPPO found that an Ann Arbor Public Schools policy requiring school employees to protect a student’s gender identity from their parents “likely violates FERPA.” The departments have given the district until Aug. 10 to “demonstrate why ED and DOJ should not move forward with enforcement.”

U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in the release that the policies were “an affront to basic moral principles” and to parents’ rights under federal law. “Today, ED and DOJ are putting districts on notice that we will use every tool available to hold them to account for this egregious behavior,” McMahon said.