FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—Illinois parents are considering a lawsuit after their kids’ school district stood by its policy of placing males with female high school students on overnight trips while withholding information from parents.
“In light of the district failing to recognize their legal obligations to D128 families and educators, Liberty Justice Center is beginning to speak with potential plaintiffs about pursuing litigation,” Kathryn Cosgrove, counsel at the center, told the Daily Signal in a statement Thursday.
The policies of Community High School District 128, in Northern Illinois, direct staff to not disclose a student’s “transgender” status, to assign overnight-trip rooms according to students’ gender identity, and to incorporate transgender materials into curricula and libraries, according to a legal demand letter from Liberty Justice Center. The center’s letter claimed the policies violate federal law and demanded the district reconsider them.
The district’s attorneys sent a response letter Wednesday, acknowledging “that this is an evolving area of law” but also defending the policies under current federal and state privacy laws. The district claimed that it made accommodations for concerned students and said it would continue enforcing the policies.
As a result, the center is speaking with parents about a possible lawsuit.
Placing a Boy With Girls
The district had placed a male student with girls on an overnight trip without informing parents, Liberty Justice Center previously told the Daily Signal.
“We’re aware of several families whose daughters were directly affected by these policies, meaning not only exposure to unconstitutional curricula and ‘secret gender transition’ policies, but also being forced to share overnight accommodations with a biological male,” Cosgrove said last week.
Since the overnight-trip policy restricts disclosure of a student’s transgender status, parents were not informed when the school reportedly assigned a male to room with their daughters, Liberty Justice Center claims. The district serves between 3,300 and 3,500 students at Libertyville High School and Vernon Hills High School.
The district’s policy allows for a student to sleep “in a single bed,” as an exception to the standard minimum of three to a room, but the student “would incur any additional cost for this accommodation,” according to a copy of the policy provided by Liberty Justice Center.
According to the letter, the district’s guidelines mandate that school libraries and curricula incorporate “gender diversity as well as gender-affirming literature,” without parental notice or opt-out provisions. The guidelines further state that staff “should not disclose information that reveals a student’s transgender status to others unless authorized by the student and documented in the Gender Support Plan.”
The School District’s Response
District 128 claims in response that disclosing the gender identity of a male student housed with girls would violate federal privacy standards.
“Your letter suggests that parental rights require that the district provide parents with the private, confidential information of another student, specifically their biological sex, without that student’s or their parents’ consent,” the response letter states.
Such disclosure would violate the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and the Illinois School Student Records Act, the letter states.
“The Overnight Trip Procedures afford parents significant control over their child’s participation in overnight trips,” the letter argues. “If a student or their parents are concerned about their student’s room assignment, alternative arrangements will be considered for the student, and individual room requests may be made and considered.”
The district’s letter also claims that its policies do not require concealing a student’s gender identity from the student’s own parents.
“Consistent with the Supreme Court’s decision in Mirabelli, nowhere do the guidelines suggest that information regarding a student’s gender identity be denied to or concealed from that student’s parents,” the district claims.
The letter states that binding precedent in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit “requires student access to locker rooms and restrooms consistent with their gender identity,” and that the Illinois Human Rights Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity.
The district says that many of these issues remain unsettled. “The district is continuously monitoring updates to the legal landscape in this area,” the letter states.
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[ H/T The Daily Signal ]
