SELINSGROVE- The Selinsgrove Area School District has announced that it will not change their decision to adhere to the Title IX guidance that was issued by the Departments of Justice and Education last year.
On February 22 this year, both US departments issued new memos telling districts to disregard the guidance from last year, but the Selinsgrove board says for now they will not revoke the decision. It allows transgender students to use the bathrooms and locker rooms of their chosen gender identities.
Board President Larry Augustine explains, “We have decided still to stay our main course since there are so many loose ends among various levels of courts, not only in Pennsylvania, but also in many other states. We are going to maintain our status quo of allowing transgender students to use the bathroom of their gender identification and locker rooms of their gender identification.”
The school board has not yet voted on any policy regarding the decision. District Superintendent Chad Cohrs explains that for now, the board is standing by their position, and says their Policy and Education committee will review new information on this topic as it comes out.
Cohrs said, “We continue to follow things as they come out, and if there is enough information that comes out that would cause us to change direction one way or the other, the board would certainty do that.”
The announcement was met with a protest from some parents of children in the district. Jody Muncer, a mother of two Selinsgrove area students, presented an 1,100 signature petition asking the board to protect the privacy of students.
She said, “We would like to see the board remove the transgender bathroom, I guess, ‘non-policy’, since they haven’t actually taken a vote on it and instituted any formal policy. We want them to preserve and protect the right of every student to have privacy in enclosed spaces with other students, so, locker rooms, bathrooms, things of that nature. Any time a student is in a state of undress, we believe that a student has the right to privacy.”
Superintendent Cohrs also explains that there is a procedure for the allowance of a student to use the bathroom and locker room of their gender identity, “It needs to be a decision that the parents, the students, the counselors, and the administration sit down and have a discussion on to truly make sure that it’s not a whim, but it really is the wishes of the child and the parents, that this is the direction that the family is going, the child is going, that they truly are viewing themselves as that particular gender.”
The board’s statement will be available to read in full on their website seal-pa.org (Ashley Thomas)
