The Board of Trustees are working to grapple with a new policy that extends family and parental rights and poses threats to LGBTQ+ students along with alliance organizations in the MCPS school district. Board members discussed means of action to challenge the policy, including a route to intend to be sued in order to challenge the new policy.
Senate bill 518, causing deliberation in MCPS policy 2159, declares students using alternative pronouns/names to notify the parents, along with parental consent to allow a child to join a club or organization, which specifically targets school clubs like Gender Sexuality Alliance (GSA). The policy goes as far to say that parents are to be notified if a transgender student is attending an overnight school trip. Other additions to the policy have left the board at a loss of where to go next, unsure of how best to counter.
During the board meeting held on Sept. 12, extensive conversation was held, surrounding ways in which to challenge the law and to address new parental rights that potentially put kids in danger.
“A historically abused and vulnerable population of children is at stake here,” said council member Meg Whicher during the meeting, going on to highlight how any minor change directly impacts a population of students.
Reaching the one hour mark, solutions and ways to counter the policy began to circle, “I thought council’s advice was, if you want litigation challenging this, what you should do is adopt it and then get sued,” said council member Koan Mercer.
“Are we going to tell every kid going to state basketball that there is a trans kid on the trip?” Mercer continued, highlighting the vagueness of the policy, “I don’t think we’re saying that, but is that what the statute’s demanding of us?”.
The law specifically states, “procedures by which a parent shall provide written consent before the parent’s child uses a name or nickname other than the child’s legal name or before the parent’s child uses a pronoun that does not align with the child’s sex”. This along with many other lines, is what has been causing a stumble within the trustees for solutions.
The fine line between adhering to the law to challenge it, and putting kids at risk was a key point in conversations. “We don’t want to put kids in a tough spot,” said recently elected Superintendent Michah Hill.
However, the end of the meeting was met with no conclusion.
There is an intense process to change policies such as this one within the school board. “The policies are put out to the public for readings, one and two, then the board moves to either adopt them or not to adopt them” said Board of Trustees president, Wilena Old Person. The choice not to adopt the policy however, could lead to a slew of legal issues potentially putting the individual board members at risk.
Clubs such as GSA are specifically at the forefront of this law. “Students should be able to join LGBTQ+ clubs if they want to,” said Hellgate GSA club president, Kobe Espinoza. Espinoza went on to say that although it has not directly been discussed within the club, alterations to the policy will directly impact the club.
“It seems so counterintuitive to pass something and to hope the people that we agree with will sue us to change the thing,” said council member Nancy Hobbins during the meeting.
Espinoza along with many other students are supporting the ones who would challenge the policy if passed. “We plan to keep going,” said Espinoza, referring to the operation of GSA.
The Board of Trustee meeting held on Oct 24 will further discuss the policy and future changes within the MCPS school district.
