Under the guise of a funding threat, the Wake County School Board fast-tracked a policy change to comply with Biden’s Title IX language. The policy puts girls at risk and strips protections for free speech from public school students and staff. I voted against these changes because our girls’ safety and our rights are not for sale.
Wake County’s new policy erodes Title IX, which was originally created to protect women’s rights, by redefining sex to gender identity. It forces females to share showers, bathrooms, and locker rooms with males. If you have a daughter in Wake County Public Schools, she could be forced to share her bedroom with a biological male during an overnight stay. If your daughter expresses discomfort or concern for her safety when confronted with biological boys occupying her private spaces, she could be disciplined for discrimination. This new policy puts a hand over the mouth of girls regarding their private spaces.
In Loudoun County, Virginia, because of a similar policy, a boy was permitted to enter a girls’ bathroom, where he sexually assaulted a young girl. She was not the first one. The family is now suing for $30 million. WCPSS will now be subjected to similar liability issues. With the changes to this policy anyone, including teachers and families, who would have questioned the boy could face charges of sex discrimination.
This new policy also has a heavy-handed mandate to require reporting of any perceived harassment. WCPSS’ new policy will punish anyone for not using preferred pronouns, which, by the way, is not proper English. We need more emphasis on literacy, not using incorrect pronouns, like they and them, which refers to multiple people. It is just not proper English, and it’s confusing.
How many girls need to be hurt before we realize the physical and emotional trauma this can cause, especially for girls recovering from sexual assault? Girls will be afraid to enter bathrooms or to join sports (a separate proposal from Biden is pending after November). They will worry about their scholarship possibilities now being at risk. They will be afraid to sign up for field trips not knowing who will be sleeping in their bed. When do our biological female students’ rights count? No wonder our children are confused; look at our leadership.
Biden’s Title IX changes are not law; it is new guidance on the language in a regulation. And at this moment the revision is being legally challenged in 26 states and is on hold in 15 states. A federal court halted the rule change for Kansas, Wyoming, Utah, Alaska, and for members of three national organizations.
Title IX provisions are evolving, yet it was still pushed through with a 7-2 vote. I offered amendments to keep protections for our biological female students, including a solution of single-stall bathrooms to provide private and safe spaces for trans students. My amendments were unilaterally shut down.
The NC Department of Public Instruction has no role in implementing the rule, and they are not providing any guidance to any school district. It is a local decision and ours was based on politics and incorrect information submitted referencing the Grimm case, where the Fourth Circuit stated a student was allowed to use bathrooms according to gender identity. Grimm applied solely to that student in that particular Virginia school.
I have spent the last 19 months on the board asking to strengthen our bullying policy to protect all students equally and with consistency. In this time, I have repeatedly requested for us to listen to families and address the concerns of bullying and discipline, which is seriously harming our youth. Before anything else, student safety is our number one job.
Instead of addressing bullying, we have revisited policy issues such as the dress code, promptly adopted the new Crown Act, and now Title IX. While students get intimidated, violently assaulted, and harassed in cafeterias and bathrooms, we have done nothing but prioritize adult agendas. Students assaulted at school identify as victims, but nobody is rushing to make a stronger policy or implementing a procedure to protect them.
Parents and students are ignored, and then we are shocked when they leave with an Opportunity Scholarship. As long as we put polarized, political, adult-driven agendas above students’ safety and academics, students will continue to flee public schools.
Only now, when gender identity comes into play, does the board feel the need to rush a widely challenged decision to promote its agenda. Yes, transgender students should have protections, but so should all students. We don’t need to sacrifice the safety of one student over another. If this is about equity, let’s make it about equity by ensuring all of our students are safe.