Anti-Trans Policy on Bathroom Access Considered by Va. School Board
A school board in Virginia is considering a policy that would require transgender students to make a written request, approved by their parents, to use the restrooms and changing rooms consistent with their gender identity — and many parents and LGBTQ+ rights supporters are enraged.The policy, which was written by the anti-LGBTQ+ group Alliance Defending Freedom, was introduced Tuesday at the Hanover County School Board meeting, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports.The county is in the Richmond metropolitan area.
It's the same school district that apologized last week after revealing a logo that many likened to a swastika.“The policy suggests that the written request may contain several personal documents related to the student including their disciplinary or criminal records, as well as signed statements from the student’s doctor or therapist ‘verifying that the student has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria and/or that the student consistently and authentically expresses a binary gender identity,’” the Times-Dispatch reports.
Board attorney Lisa Seward, who presented the policy, said those documents are not required.The principal of the student’s school would then summarize the request and send it on to the school board, which would make the final decision on whether to grant it.Board members did not discuss the policy, but several parents spoke up during a public comment period. “Not only does [a student] have to explain transgenderism to you, not only do I have to support it, but somehow we’re to give you personal, invasive information from our medical provider or therapist to also support who he is — and all of this is just to use the bathroom,” said Dana Clark, the parent of a trans child, according to the.
