NJ sues more schools over policies to 'out' trans kids to their parents

The New Jersey Attorney General’s Office is suing three more school districts over policies it says would force school staff to out transgender and non-binary students to their parents.

The action is the latest salvo in a widening debate playing across school districts in New Jersey, and the nation, over what obligations and rights schools have to notify parents of students' sexuality or gender identity.

The policies — adopted Tuesday in the Manalapan-Englishtown, Middletown and Marlboro districts — all borrow their language from the state’s Transgender Student Guidance for School Districts. But each omits guidance from the state that there’s “no affirmative duty for any school district personnel to notify a student’s parent or guardian of the student’s gender identity or expression.”

Instead, in Manalapan-Englishtown and Middletown, the policies say if a student requests a “public social transition accommodation” — such as being newly addressed by a preferred pronoun — parents or guardians are to be told. Otherwise, conversations about a student’s gender identity are confidential. The Marlboro policy doesn’t limit notification to when a child asks for such an “accommodation,” but simply says parents should be notified when a student changes their gender identity or expression.

Attorney General Matthew Platkin’s Office contends the policies violate the state’s law against discrimination, which prohibits unequal treatment based on factors including race, color, national origin, “affectional or sexual orientation” and “gender identity and expression.”

Platkin also argues the policies would put students' safety at risk.

“The policies expose these students to the potential for severe harms to their safety and mental health,” Platkin’s office said in a statement Thursday.

His office filed Division of Civil complaints against each school district, and is asking superior court judges for preliminary injunctions and temporary restraints to keep the measures from being implemented.

Platkin’s office is also continuing to negotiate with Hanover schools, after suing that district over a policy that specifically listed “sexual activity; sexuality; sexual orientation; transitioning; gender identity or expression" among reasons schools should notify parents about developments that might affect their children’s well-being.

After the attorney general’s office sued, Hanover’s school board adopted a revised version of its policy that dropped any language about sexual or gender identity. But the attorney general’s office said it wasn't satisfied it wouldn’t be used to out LGBTQ students, and the parties are due back in court next week, NorthJersey.com reports.

The newly adopted policies in Manalapan-Englishtown, Marlboro and Middletown — like the Hanover policy — make exceptions in cases where staff members have reason to believe notifying a parent could put a child in danger.

Marc Zitomer, an attorney for Marlboro schools, said that district’s leaders “vehemently disagree” with any suggestion it’s improper to notify a parent of a minor’s gender identity or expression. He noted the district would first reach out to the child before contacting parents.

Policies in all three districts call for children to be given the opportunity to disclose their identities to their parents before being contacted by school officials.

“It is our position that keeping parents in the dark about important issues involving their children is counterintuitive and contrary to well established Supreme Court case law that says that parents have a constitutional right to direct and control the upbringing of their children,” he said.

Manalapan-Englishtown Superintendent of Schools Nicole Santora declined comment. Middletown officials did not immediately return a phone call and email Thursday seeking comment.

“School policies that single out or target LGBTQ+ youth fly in the face of our state’s longstanding commitment to equality,” Sundeep Iyer, director of the state Division on Civil Rights, said in a statement Thursday from Platkin’s office. “Our laws prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity or expression, plain and simple, and we will not waver in our commitment to enforcing those protections.”

Thursday, the “Chaos and Control” newsletter — a product of the New Jersey Project coalition of parents that also opposes the state’s LGBTQ-inclusive curricula and its sex education requirements — urged members to contact Platkin’s office in protest. The newsletter, written under the pseudonym "Mathgoddes," argued kids who are "compelled" to change their gender identities are at risk of depression or suicide, and that parents could "persuade them to be level headed and get help.”

The Manalapan-Englishtown and Middletown policies both say that when a parent and student disagree on a new pronoun or name change request, the district must honor the student’s choice. But Marlboro’s policy, instead says the district should consult with the student and parent to “develop a plan for how the student will be referred to at school.”

Manalapan-Englishtown’s policy also only gives precedence to older students’ assertions about their identities. For students in pre-K through grade five, “the responsibility for determining a student’s gender identity rests with the student’s parents/guardians,” it states. The district does not have a high school.

According to reports by Patch news sites, meetings in the three districts that adopted policies this week were packed with parents.

"Let it go on the record that each of you are aware that LGBTQ youth are at the highest risk of suicide. ... You will have blood on your hands should a trans student [take] their life because of the repercussions,” Patch quoted one parent telling the Middletown school board. “We've had [teen] suicides in Middletown. Do you want to make it another one?"

During WNYC’s “Ask Governor Murphy” Tuesday, Murphy said the state would be “vigilant to the max” in fighting school policies it sees as anti-trans.

“We’re living in this us-vs.-them moment — I wish it were a moment — era in our country. And invariably, communities like the trans community are the big losers. They’re the ones that get singled out,” he said. “They’re the ones that get behind the eight ball. And it just offended me at the core.”

The state’s transgender policy guidance, issued by the Department of Education in 2018 directs schools to accept students’ asserted gender identities, without any requirement for parental consent.

The guidance generally describes a students' transgender status as confidential, but also includes direction for disclosure in the case of a "specific and compelling need, such as the health and safety of a student or an incident of bias-related crime."

The New Jersey School Boards Association, in a sample policy it provides to districts, warns disclosing confidential information, including to parents, could violate privacy laws. It says students who don't want parents or guardians to know about transgender status should be addressed on a case-by-case basis, mindful that disclosure to parents carries risks such as a student being kicked out of their home.