The California Senate is weighing a bill that would protect students against the “forced outing” of their gender transition efforts to his or her parents.
The Support Academic Futures and Educators for Today’s Youth Act reads, “Parents and families have an important role to play in the lives of young people. Studies confirm that LGBTQ+ youth thrive when they have parental support and feel safe sharing their full identities with them, but it can be harmful to force young people to share their full identities before they are ready.”
“Policies that forcibly ‘out’ pupils without their consent remove opportunities for LGBTQ+ young people and their families to build trust and have these conversations when they are ready,” the bill continues.
The bill specifically prohibits “school districts, county offices of education, charter schools, and the state special schools, and a member of the governing board or body of those educational entities, from enacting or enforcing any policy, rule, or administrative regulation that requires an employee or a contractor to disclose any information related to a pupil’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression to any other person without the pupil’s consent unless otherwise required by law, as provided.”
Although the bill is under consideration from the Senate, local offices have passed measures requiring parental notification of a child’s gender.
The Orange County Unified School District board passed a transgender notification policy in September.
According to the policy, a certified staff member or principal is required to tell parents if their child under 12 years of age is requesting to use different pronouns or requests to participate in activities differing from the student’s “assigned biological sex at birth.”
