This story by Liberty Darr was first published in The Other Paper on Nov. 22.
A new draft South Burlington School District policy affirms the rights of transgender and nonbinary students.
The district’s director of diversity, equity, inclusion, anti-racism and social emotional learning, Monica Desrochers, alongside four students, unveiled the draft policy at last Wednesday’s board meeting.
The six-page policy was modeled mostly after 2017 Vermont Agency of Education guidelines that outline how to support students whose gender identity is different than their assigned sex at birth or who do not identify as male or female.
She said the policy was initially vetted by both the high school’s Gender and Sexuality Alliance and the Queer Straight Alliance in the middle school before heading to counseling staff and administration for feedback.
“What I didn’t want to do is move a policy forward that is most impacting transgender students without their voice or even motivation for wanting it,” Desrochers said. “So that feedback from the (Gender and Sexuality Alliance) in the high school was strong in terms of, ‘Yes, we need this.’”
The policy outlines students’ right to privacy and if adopted would require district staff and school records to use a student’s preferred name and pronouns. The policy also states that a student — or parent or legal caregiver in the case of a minor student — who is currently enrolled may request retroactive changes to school records, including name and gender.
Although other districts have adopted similar policies, South Burlington’s draft policy closely follows the Champlain Valley School District’s newly approved policy that uses more affirmative language beyond what was suggested by the Agency of Education when it comes to a student’s use of facilities like locker rooms and restrooms.
The state says a transgender student “should not have to” use a locker room or bathroom that conflicts with their gender identity, but the draft policy states that a student “must be permitted to” use the aligned facility.
“We’re not just saying ‘should be allowed,’ which was the guidance from the Agency of Education,” Angela Arsenault, chair of the Champlain Valley School Board, said in September. “We’re saying, in policy, that students must be permitted to use a locker room, a restroom that aligns with their gender identity.”
Uniquely, South Burlington’s policy has special designations for curriculum implementation, professional development and annual monitoring that supports staff in the inclusion of LGBTQ curriculum and training for all staff members and administration.
“I really love ours because it includes curriculum and annual monitoring,” Desrochers said. “So, for me, those are two huge pieces that I think sometimes get left out. I think if we are asking teachers to create inclusive variances in their daily lessons for students, in today’s political climate, it’s really important to have the protection of a policy to support our teachers in taking risks and feeling comfortable in doing the work best for our students.”
Desrochers said that a policy like this helps students to understand, on a more tangible level, the implications of how other states and school districts are dealing with transgender students and policies.
According to the New York Times, nine states have banned transgender students from using bathrooms and locker rooms consistent with their gender identity and 17 states have enacted bans or significant new restrictions on some or all gender-affirming care for minors.
“We actually have transgender youth in our districts who have left states who have anti-trans laws,” Desrochers said. “It is really powerful for students, Vermonters, to be in the same classroom as someone who has recently come to the state because of homophobia.”
“One student told a story about how they had a teacher who used to put trans inclusive books in their backpack in the state that they were in because they couldn’t have them in their library and they couldn’t read them in class,” she said.
The draft must undergo two more public readings at school board meetings, which will take place on Dec. 6 and Dec. 20, before it can be officially enacted into policy.
Desrochers said that the district will then turn its attention to drafting a policy protecting the rights of transgender and nonbinary staff.
“We actually first played with the idea of having one policy to protect both transgender and nonbinary staff and students,” she said. “But we are advised to stick to one party per policy. That is definitely something that is on the horizon for us.”
