Pennsylvania school agency scraps policy hiding student gender changes from parents 

A Pennsylvania school agency dropped a policy preventing parents from learning that their children had started using different names and pronouns at school, lawyers who challenged the rule announced last week.

The Chester County Intermediate Unit scrapped the policy after the Independence Law Center and Alliance Defending Freedom sent a letter arguing that the policy violated parents’ rights and teachers’ religious freedom.

The agency, based in Downingtown outside Philadelphia, provides services to 12 school districts with nearly 86,000 students. It also runs programs such as Brandywine Virtual Academy, where the legal groups represented a client. BVA serves more than 3,400 students in Chester County.

The repeal concerns the agency’s policy. It doesn’t mean all 12 districts changed their rules.

“Chester County School District unlawfully interfered with parents’ fundamental right to make decisions concerning their children’s care by actively hiding vital information from them,” Independence Law Center Chief Counsel Randall Wenger said.

Similar rules exist across the country.

Defending Education’s list, last updated in June, said at least 1,219 districts have policies allowing or directing staff to hide a student’s transgender status from parents. Those districts had more than 12.3 million students at 21,352 schools.

The list included 30 Pennsylvania districts, including Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.

Chester County’s Policy 103.2 gave students a say in whether staff could tell parents about their gender identity. It prevented staff from sharing that information “unless legally required to do so or unless the student has authorized such disclosure.”

That policy allowed staff to use one name and set of pronouns with a child at school while using the child’s legal name and sex-based pronouns when speaking with parents.

A school database also tracked whether parents knew about the changes, the legal groups said. Staff could use that information to hide the changes from parents.

The lawyers’ May 11 letter said employees faced discipline if they didn’t follow the policy. It said forcing teachers to use names or pronouns that conflict with a child’s sex violated their religious freedom.

The letter also challenged the school’s authority to disregard parents who told staff to use their child’s real name and pronouns. Lawyers asked officials to repeal the policy and tell teachers in writing to stop following earlier instructions to hide the changes.

The challenge drew on a March 2 Supreme Court ruling in Mirabelli v. Bonta, which Heartlander News previously covered.

The court restored protections for parents challenging California’s gender secrecy policies while the case continued. It found that parents would likely prevail on their claims that the policies violated their right to raise their children, including their right to guide their religious upbringing.

California argued that its rules protected student safety and privacy.

“But those policies cut out the primary protectors of children’s best interests: their parents,” the court wrote.