A push to out queer, trans, and non-binary students following a flurry of far right disinformation campaigns about LGBTQ students and teachers has gone largely unchallenged — until now.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic first upended school policies across the country in 2020, extremists and allies of the far right have leveraged uncertainty and fear to take over school boards en masse, including in California.
This has contributed to a recent and growing trend of California school boards enacting forced outing policies. Since 2023, more than a dozen school districts have either proposed or passed policies requiring teachers to notify parents if their child identifies as transgender or asks to be identified by different names or pronouns while at school.
These policies lead to rises in bullying and discrimination across the board, which have measurable effects on the mental health of LGBTQ students.
San Diego Assemblymember Chris Ward (D) has introduced the Support Academic Futures and Educators for Today’s Youth Act, also called the SAFETY Act, along with the California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus. Their stated goal is to ensure that all students have a safe and supportive environment to learn, regardless of their identity.
“Teachers should not be the gender police and violate the trust and safety of the students in their classrooms,” said Ward in a statement about AB 1955.
“Parents should be talking to their children, and the decision for a student to come out to their family members should be on their own terms. The SAFETY Act simply ensures that conversations about gender identity and sexuality happen at home without interference from others outside of the family unit.”
The act will prohibit school districts from implementing forced outing policies, provide resources for parents and students to navigate conversations around gender and identity on their own terms, and ensure teachers or school staff are not retaliated against for refusing to forcibly out a student. It would also make California the first state to explicitly prohibit forced outing policies in schools.
“School campuses should be safe places for students to learn and grow as their authentic selves,” said Sen. Susan Talamantes Eggman, the California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus chair.
“The SAFETY Act is a critical piece of legislation that seeks to protect everyone on school campuses, especially LGBTQ+ students,” she added.
“When and how a person comes out is a conversation that should be reserved for a student and a parent, not arbitrarily forced on unsuspecting youth by a school administration.”
AB 1955 is expected to be heard in the Senate Education Committee next week.