"Gender Fluidity" Sweeping Our County's Schools; Get Ready, It Will Sweep Our Country's Schools (Installment #1)

In March 2015, the Fairfax County Virginia School Board announced it would be voting to add “gender identity” to its nondiscrimination policy list.

On May 7, 2015, after voting in this policy (10-1), the board surprisingly introduced a sweeping set of curriculum changes (8.5 and 10.5 are directly contrary to Church teaching), many of which are directly contrary to Church teaching and to the moral teachings of other faiths.

These sweeping curriculum changes will be put to a vote on June 25, 2015. Please note that while they say these curriculum changes were not a result of the nondiscrimination policy vote, the wording is unmistakably so.

Taking a big deep breath, I'm going to get over the fact that I'm actually discussing this topic at all.

I need to first emphasize that the Obama administration and the Department of Education have explicitly declared that they will pull funding from schools that do not include gender identity nondiscrimination policies.

“Tamara Derenak Koufax, of Fairfax County Public Schools, released a statement which said the federal government left the board no choice.

‘The U.S. Department of Education has told school districts that transgender students are protected from discrimination under Title IX and has recently required some school districts including Alexandria, Va., to amend their policies to expressly include gender identity.’

“Elizabeth Schultz was the only board member to oppose the policy change. But she says Koufax is right about the federal intrusion.

‘They’ve threatened that if we do not they will pull our federal education funds, free and reduced meal money for impoverished students,’ said Schultz to the Washington Examiner.”

These quotes are taken from this article, "Obama to Schools, Gender Bend or Lose Funding."

With that knowledge, please understand without a doubt, this issue is coming to your diocese, to your county, to your state. I request that this article and some of the considerations be shared with as many people as possible. These curriculum changes are directly contrary to Church teaching, and they are contrary to the teachings of many other faiths as well. With a group called Gender Spectrum behind the language, these curriculum changes will likely be repeated across our nation. I will explore in future posts the specific language concerns that Catholics should be encouraged to raise in response to “gender fluidity” curriculum changes as soon as they begin to sweep school districts across the nation.