A New York City high school has canceled its all-female swimming class, forcing Muslim girls to make the co-educational option

Muslim girls protested at Stuyvesant High School in New York City after the school canceled its all-female swimming class, forcing them to take a co-ed option.

This elite Manhattan public school requires students to take a swimming class in order to graduate. She previously offered a women’s version, but demand for the class conflicts with scheduling, leading the school to cancel the option.

Now, the Muslim girls at the school have no choice but to take a co-ed class and risk their modesty in order to fulfill the requirements.

Many of the affected teens respond by refusing to attend the co-ed activity, saying they would rather risk failure than betray their faith.

A sophomore said, “I know girls who are failing at it now.” New York Post.

The pool at the community center at Stuyvesant High School

Brian Moran (pictured) is the Assistant Director of Safety, Security, and Physical Education at Stuyvesant High School in New York

Girls’ swimming classes at the prestigious public college junior high school were no longer an option when classes started again last fall following the COVID-19 pandemic.

The popularity of the categories has created a programming impasse.

Brian Moran, the school’s assistant director of physical education, told the school’s student newspaper, The Spectator, that the girls’ swimming gym was removed because it “created a huge problem, mostly with programming.”

He said that a large number of female students requested a gymnasium class and that the extra classes required would conflict with the scheduling of science laboratories that are held on consecutive days.

He explained that a trained lifeguard and teacher should be present during swimming lessons.

Moran said that young Muslim women could wear a “burkini” – a full-body swimsuit in which only the face, hands and feet are visible. But some women don’t feel comfortable wearing form-fitting suits in front of the opposite sex.

An Education Department insider revealed to the newspaper that Stuyvesant may be violating a government regulation. Chancellor’s Regulation A-630 requires schools to grant “accommodation for religious ceremonies and practices” whenever possible.

A 16-year-old Muslim student in grade 10 said, “The religious swimsuit will stick to your body when you leave the pool, so it’s still embarrassing.”

Song Yu (pictured) is the principal of Stuyvesant High School in New York

There are 3,300 students studying in the junior high school of the public college

Stuyvesant fourth-year student Tasneem Chowdhury participated in the girls’ swimming class as a sophomore, and hopes the school will give her back to her younger classmates.

“I’m not comfortable swimming with boys because I’m a Muslim and that’s really hard for us,” Chowdhury told The Post.

“I can’t believe school would change it because it was such an essential part of Stuy, and now it’s suddenly changed.”

It is not clear how many Muslim students the school has.

Student Sarzeel Chowdhury, 14, who took part in the co-ed swimming class and was wearing a burqa-style swimsuit, said she “didn’t really like it that much”.

“It was a little uncomfortable at first because I wasn’t used to being so close to boys,” she said.

Student Joy Chen called on principal Seung C. Yu to reinstate the all-girls classes and called the decision to get rid of them “a blatant disregard for the faith of a large proportion of the students” in a student paper.

“[Students]are left powerless to choose between their creed or their Stuyvesant diploma,” she wrote.