Debi Jackson is the mother of a transgender girl named Avery. They live in the Kansas City area.
Recently Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos visited Kansas City and dropped by a couple of schools...as part of her Rethink Schools Tour.
One of the schools was the private Kansas City Academy. KCA and the other school are both supportive of their transgender students.
But that may have given her a rosy picture of what life is like for trans youth in the middle of the country. I wanted to be sure she heard other stories to have a broader perspective of what students are experiencing, especially since her department and the Justice Department withdrew vital guidance supporting transgender students earlier this year.
I reached out to the Department of Education, and Sec. DeVos was open to speaking with me. She and Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Candice Jackson called me last week.
--Jackson
I started by telling Sec. DeVos about two high schools in Olathe, Kansas. At one school, the GSA students were taunted and laughed at both in person and on Snapchat. The principal’s response was minimal, no one was punished, and the harassment of those students has only increased in the subsequent weeks.
At the other school — in the same district — LGBTQ students were similarly teased. That principal immediately sent out a letter to all families saying that she would not stand for any student harming the mental or emotional well-being of a fellow student through harassment and intimidation.
I told Sec. DeVos that it is completely unacceptable that LGBTQ students see different outcomes when bullied based only on the neighborhood where their parents have a home and which school they are funneled into, or which city or state they live in.
Federal protections such as those offered through Title IX have been affirmed time and time again in courts and should apply equally across the country. Rescinding the guidance offered by the Department of Education in 2016 has only led to more problems for trans students, because school administrators and school boards in communities where misunderstanding about trans youth are still widespread are feeling empowered to deny them their rights.
--Jackson
I challenged Sec. DeVos to find a single parent in this country whose cisgender child was harmed by sharing a bathroom with a trans child. I guarantee she won’t find any parent like that. Trans children are the ones at risk. Children like my daughter are dying for nothing more than being themselves. I told her about two that we lost in the last couple of months and that I hoped she thought even losing one was one too many.
I challenged Sec. DeVos to do something about this — something more than hopeful words about wanting transgender and gender non-conforming children to be treated fairly. DeVos and Education Department officials have said they will “evaluate” complaints of discrimination from LGBTQ students, but they refuse to say clearly that the law protects them or that they will actually do anything about the discrimination children like mine face.