Georgia education and political leaders were figuring out what to do after an Obama administration directive Friday shoved a culture-wars sexual issue onto school campuses.
The directive advises schools on the treatment of transgender students, including suggestions that schools let them use the restrooms and locker rooms that fit their chosen gender identity.
The state’s school superintendent said he wasn’t ready to issue any recommendations to Georgia’s 180 school districts, but noted he has strong reservations about the federal guidelines.
“I believe there are safety concerns associated with allowing students of different genders to use the same bathroom,” Richard Woods said in a written statement. “For that reason, I do not believe a student of another gender should use a restroom alongside students of the opposite sex.”
The directive is not a federal law. But schools that do not follow it could face lawsuits or a loss of federal aid, as happened in North Carolina.
Some social conservatives were ready to take on the federal directive, even suggesting Georgia forgo the federal funding it receives for public education. Georgia received about $2 billion this year. The state's current annual education budget, including federal funds, is about $10.6 billion.
"We need people to develop a spine and stand up to this," said Jane Robbins, a Gwinnett County resident who is a senior fellow for the American Principles Project, a conservative-leaning think tank.
LGBT activists and transgender students, meanwhile, applauded the announcement.
Eris Sage Lovell, 18, a senior at Cobb County’s Walton High who is transgender, said the decision could make it easier for other transgender students to better adjust to school.
“It’s an incredible improvement,” Lovell said.
Metro Atlanta's largest school districts and college systems were among the few not talking Friday about the directive and whether they will follow it. Cobb, Clayton, Fulton and Gwinnett officials, and spokesmen for both of its public college systems, said they were reviewing the guidelines and needed more time to comment. Several refused to explain their current restroom policies for transgender students.
Atlanta Superintendent Meria Carstarphen said Friday she welcomed the guidance and would explore necessary changes.
“The guidance I think feels more right because schools have struggled with this,” she said. “Just having a good baseline of guidance that is supported by the Department of Justice takes a lot of questions out of people’s minds and we can serve students better.”
In Atlanta, if a family brings a student’s circumstances to a school’s attention, staff can develop a plan to support the student. That could include allowing the student to use the shared restroom of his or her choice, a single-user restroom or a staff restroom.
Restroom options for transgender people have been a hotly-debated issue nationally in recent months. The U.S. Justice Department and North Carolina sued each other this week over that state's contentious law that restricts transgender access to bathrooms and locker rooms. President Obama has criticized the North Carolina law. Presumptive Republican Party presidential nominee Donald Trump said Friday it's an issue that should be decided by each state.
The flap hit Fannin County Thursday night when parents turned out en masse at a school board meeting to express their concerns about a situation there. Georgia House Speaker David Ralston, whose district includes Fannin, wrote in a letter dated Friday to Georgia's U.S. senators: "(M)y concern regarding this issue is that the federal government is dictating to our locally-elected Board of Education with regards to the policies they enact in a way never before seen."
Ralston and other Republican lawmakers are still angry that Gov. Nathan Deal vetoed a “religious liberty” bill that supporters said would protect religious viewpoints and prevent discrimination against faith-based groups and individuals opposed to same-sex marriage.
State Rep. Allen Peake, R-Macon, echoed Ralston’s comments and said there may be legislative action to address the issue next year. Deal’s office declined to discuss the directive Friday.
The directive has drawn incredulity in one rural Georgia school district. Tim Cochran, superintendent of the Atkinson County School District near Tifton, said it’s an “alarming” turn of events. The few residents he had a chance to talk with about it Friday morning didn’t understand why the feds were taking a stand on the issue.
Cochran worries about the potential for unrest, and for violence.
“You can’t just throw all the rules and procedures out,” he said. “The rule is boys use the boys (restroom) and girls use the girls (restroom). We’ve had that for a few generations and, honestly, we’ve not had any issues.”
Sally Harrell, a parent of two high school students in DeKalb, said the issue of what bathroom a transgender student uses is a non-issue in her household.
“I don’t think they have any problem with it,” she said of her teens, both tenth-graders at Lakeside High School. “I personally have no issues with the (federal guidelines). I don’t believe there are any safety issues. I don’t fear for my children whatsoever.”
Lovell, who was born a boy, mostly uses the girls restroom at her school, but there’s also a gender non-specific restroom she can use. Lovell said when she was still “largely masculine” a teacher once made her go to boys bathroom because it was closer to Lovell’s classroom.
“I cried for a few minutes,” saidLovell, who was on the school’s homecoming court in 2014. “I felt so completely out of place.”
Lovell plans to attend Kennesaw State University this fall, in part, because the school has a dorm for LGBT students.
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