By Mark Spooner | August 7, 2024
In 2022-23, when transgender advocates urged the Fairfax County School Board to eliminate gender-separate sex-ed classes for boys and girls, 84% of the community opposed the idea in a public survey. The School Board therefore ducked the issue and didn’t vote on it. Nonetheless, FCPS administrators thereafter quietly decided to proceed with a version of the proposal via a “pilot program” in 14 elementary and middle schools, as previously reported here.
With the 2024-25 school year upon us, the program will be implemented soon. Parents/caregivers will have the right to “opt out” their children from the unisex classes, but unless they are alert and take affirmative action, their kids will be enrolled automatically in the unpopular classes. This is the “default option.” FCPS administrators are anticipating that a sizeable percentage of parents won’t focus on the issue and that, by default, a false aura of popularity for same-sex classes in elementary and middle schools will be created.
In order to keep its plans under the radar for as long as possible, FCPS has not publicly announced the identity of the schools in which the pilot program will be implemented, but a list has just been obtained via the Freedom of Information Act. Here is the list:
Elementary Schools:
Middle Schools:
If you have a child in any of these schools, or if you know parents/caregivers who do, it is very important to be alert and to take appropriate action, as described below.
The pilot program for unisex sex-ed will include two classes for each of Grades 5 through 8:
Other lessons in the Family Life Education curriculum for these grades will continue to be gender-separate during the pilot program.
FCPS will notify parents/caregivers that they have three options. The first is for the new “gender combined” classes; the other two are the options that have existed up until now.
I have not been able to learn when FCPS will send letters or emails to notify parents about the pilot program and the options under it. (It’s possible that some of the 14 schools have already done so.) The timing may vary school-by-school. Presumably, parents will be given a deadline for responding. So, it’s important to be on the lookout for any relevant communications from the school system, and to respond appropriately.
One other important note: I do not believe FCPS’s response form will be worded to allow parents to say, “I want my son to be enrolled only in the gender-separate boys’ class” or “I want my daughter to be enrolled only in the gender-separate girls’ class.” Under FCPS policy — which is in defiance of Virginia state law — a biological boy can decide that he wants to identify as a girl, and a biological girl can decide that she wants to identify as a boy, without their parents’ knowledge. Thus, as described in a document I have obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, if a parent chooses Option 2, above, the child can theoretically decide to participate in the gender-separate class of the opposite gender, and, unless the child consents, this choice will be kept secret from the child’s parents! I would advise parents who object to this and who choose Option 2 to write in on the response form: “I want my son to be enrolled in the gender-separate classes for boys” (or vice versa for daughters).
FCPS is attempting to sneak in a highly divisive and controversial program quietly, and it is trying to maximize participation by making gender-combined sex-ed the “default option.” The administration claims that an option for attending gender-combined classes fosters “inclusiveness” for the tiny minority of students who don’t want to choose between the two gender-separate boys’ and girls’ classes. But, even if one assumes that gender-combined is a worthwhile, additional option, FCPS could have accommodated the minority who want it by allowing them to “opt in” to gender-combined classes. It did not need to create a scheme by which the majority — who object to gender-combined — have the burden of opting out of a system that only a few people want.
FCPS is attempting to ignore the will of its citizens. To combat this, parents must be alert, not only for their own children, but must attempt to spread the word to friends and neighbors.
In addition to opting out of the gender-combined classes, citizens can voice their concerns in other ways as well, such as by letters to the School Board, letters to the editors of news media, and speaking up at School Board meetings. A substantial group of Muslim parents did this at a recent School Board meeting. The citizen-defying actions of the Board and FCPS administrators can only be defeated by publicity and combined action.