Seven major New Mexico school districts, responsible for thousands of children, have policies to help them change their sexual identity in class without their parents knowing, DailyMail.com can reveal.
Parents Defending Education (PDE), a conservative campaign group, uncovered details of the stealth transgender policies from public records requests.
The documents discovered show how teachers are ordered to help trans students change their names, pronouns, dress and sexual identity at school, without their parents’ knowledge.
Trans activists say such guidelines are vital as some children need protection from old-fashioned mums and dads who do not accept their desire to change sex.
But for many parents, they are dangerous and could deny them the opportunity to help their children as they struggle through puberty.
It is hotly debated whether teachers should help students make the transition without their parents’ knowledge.
New Mexico’s seven school districts are responsible for educating thousands of children.
PDE outreach director Erika Sanzi criticized the schools for “indefensible and probably illegal” policies.
“Any time a school participates in or facilitates a student’s transition, it is participating in a psychosocial intervention that requires parental notification and consent,” Sanzi said.
“Federal law guarantees parents the right to see all records maintained by the district, and that includes gender support plans.”
Schools and the New Mexico Department of Education did not respond to emails from DailyMail.com.
They are Los Alamos Public Schools, Rio Rancho Public Schools, Las Cruces Public Schools, Gallup-McKinley County Schools, Moriarty-Edgewood School District, Santa Fe Public Schools and the California Independent School District. Gadsden.
PDE will add them to your nationwide database of schools with secret trans policies.
It lists 18,658 schools in 1,062 districts educating a staggering 10.9 million students.
New Mexico takes a relatively progressive approach toward trans youth.
LGBTQ youth are protected from discrimination and harassment, according to the Movement Advancement Project. Democratic Gov. Michelle Grisham signed a law last year to protect sex-change procedures in the state.
Santa Fe Public Schools, which covers some 28 institutions, has perhaps the crudest secret trans policy of any New Mexico school.
The district document urges teachers to ‘MAINTAIN CONFIDENTIALITY: THIS IS CRITICAL.’
Rio Rancho Public Schools students among those affected by secret trans policies
New Mexico Students Learn About New Wave Sexual Identities Through ‘Gender Unicorn’
The campaign group’s outreach director, Erika Sanzi, criticized administrators for “indefensible and likely illegal” policies.
‘DO NOT share a student’s transgender status with anyone else,’ the internal guidance says.
‘This is HIGHLY confidential information.’
Parents do not need to be informed about a trans child unless a “student wishes to change his or her name and/or gender marker” in the school’s database, the policy states.
Additionally, the eight institutions in the Moriarty-Edgewood School District in Torrance County guide teachers on handling trans and non-binary students.
Teachers should find out if students “feel safe” and if their “parents know” about their gender change.
They are guided to organize group meetings on sex change.
When parents “don’t know” about the change, only a counselor intervenes, documents show.
The published documents include materials used to teach children about new wave gender ideology.
They present the ‘Gender Unicorn’, which dispenses with traditional notions of biological sex and presents ‘gender identity’ as fluid.
Similarly, ‘Genderbread Person’ teaches young people about intersex people and ‘genderqueers’.
“Gender and sexuality are part of a spectrum,” the document says.
“We all have characteristics that challenge heteronormativity.”
An educational cartoon video from AMAZE shows a little girl teaching her older uncle that gender now exists on a spectrum.
For many parents, this means a rapid and challenging move away from the long-held idea that people are biologically male or female.
These concerns were not limited to New Mexico.
This week, a group of parents protested a gender-supportive policy in the Eau Claire Area School District in Wisconsin.
They asked the United States Supreme Court on Wednesday to rule on trans policies that affect their children.
One lawsuit, from a group called Parents Protecting Our Children, says the district’s gender support plan violates their constitutional rights by keeping them in the dark about sex changes at school.
‘Gender Bread Person’ teaches young people about intersex people and ‘genderqueers’
Third grade students participate in the United States National Anthem at Highland Elementary School in Las Cruces, New Mexico
This chart shows insurance claims for puberty blockers in the US by year. It shows that claims have doubled since 2017
They want the high court to overturn a lower court’s dismissal of their 2022 case in March, after judges ruled that parents and children had not been directly harmed by the policy.
Nicholas Barry, a lawyer for America First Legal, the conservative campaign group that filed the papers, said the high court “should intervene and protect the rights of parents.”
“The idea that a parent is not harmed when a government official has the authority, through written policy, to socially transition a child to another sex and hide it from the parents, is simply disconnected from reality.” Barry said.
Schools are under pressure to help trans students in a contentious political environment, where gender and sex have become a front line in the culture wars between progressives and conservatives.
School administrators have said they want to involve parents, but they must follow a series of federal and state guidelines designed to protect student privacy, fight discrimination and welcome all interested parties.
These cases are becoming more common as teachers grapple with the small but growing number of children who want to change their gender at school, and the especially difficult ones who don’t want their parents to find out.
In this context, parents, children, teachers and therapists have to make difficult decisions about rising rates of transgenderism, mental health problems, peer pressure and whether affirmation on request is always the best response.
The number of transgender children ages 13 to 17 has doubled to about 1.4 percent, an analysis of government health surveys shows.
There have been similar increases in teens seeking puberty blockers, hormones and surgery, insurance data reveals.
Proponents of “gender-affirming care,” as it is known, attribute the rise to increased awareness of gender dysphoria and support among doctors.
Other experts, conservatives and parents warn of ideologically driven “social contagion.”
Disagreements over parental notification come alongside debates over whether trans teens can use school bathrooms and compete in sports aligned with their gender identities.
Again, the rules vary by state and often end up in court.
DailyMail.com has spoken to several parents of children who identify as trans. Many worry that their children have been influenced to transition by classmates, TikTok influencers, or teachers and school counselors with a drum to beat.
Some do not believe that their children are truly transgender and intend to postpone such irreversible measures as puberty blockers or surgery. Many said their children instead had mental health problems, such as depression, anxiety and autism.
