Anne Arundel Schools Revise Gender Policy After Federal Threat
The district amended its LGBTQ student regulations after federal agencies threatened to withhold funding over parents' access to gender-related records.
After the federal government threatened to withhold funding, Anne Arundel County Public Schools amended its gender policy. Parents will now be told about any accommodations made to support their children’s gender expression or identity.
The revised policy, adopted shortly before the August 24 start of the school year, follows a lawsuit filed last month by the conservative legal group America First Legal on behalf of two parents identified as John and Jane Doe in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland.
The lawsuit alleges that the school district secretly facilitated their daughter’s “gender transition” to male at school without notifying them or obtaining their consent.
According to the lawsuit, Anne Arundel County Public Schools adopted its current gender policy in 2019. The Does allege that it included guidance encouraging staff to “conceal gender identity information from parents of high school students.”
The Does say they want to educate and raise their daughter according to their religious beliefs, which reject the idea that a person can be transgender and hold that sex is binary, based on biological anatomy, and fixed at birth. They allege that multiple district employees used a male name for their daughter at school and in school documents without first obtaining their consent.
On July 27, less than three weeks after the lawsuit was filed, the U.S. Department of Education’s Student Privacy Policy Office and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division announced an investigation into Anne Arundel County Public Schools and warned that the district could lose federal funding if it did not amend its gender policy.
The federal agencies alleged that the school district had wrongly classified information about the child’s gender identity as “confidential medical information” that should not be shared with the Does.
“School districts that hide information from parents are violating federal law,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon said in a statement at the time. “FERPA [the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act] is not optional, and any districts that attempt to bypass or distort its requirements should expect immediate federal action.”
Superintendent Mark Bedell wrote in a letter to the school community that the district had revised the confidentiality section of its “Safe and Inclusive Environments for LGBTQ+ Students” regulation to comply with FERPA. The amended regulation affirms parents’ right to inspect and review their child’s complete education record.
The superintendent also noted that no provision in the regulation may interfere with a parent’s or guardian’s right to review their child’s complete education record, including any files, documents, or other materials containing information about the student.
“As made clear by these amendments, no policy, guideline, or practice may limit or otherwise interfere with parental rights under FERPA, and this includes any information maintained in education records that relates to gender identity, transgender status, sexual orientation, preferred name, or preferred pronouns,” Bedell concluded.
New Hampshire Republican Gov. Kelly Ayotte has signed a bill requiring teachers and other school employees to answer parents' questions about their children's health, well-being, behavior, and identity "completely and honestly."
Under the new law, educators must respond to a parent's written questions about their child within 10 business days without omitting any pertinent information. The State Board of Education must also update its educator code of ethics and code of conduct to reflect the disclosure requirements.
Teachers and staff who fail to respond to parental requests within the required time frame may face disciplinary action. The law provides two exceptions: when disclosure is prohibited by state or federal law, or when an educator has made a "good faith determination" that disclosure would put the student "at imminent risk" of abuse or neglect by a parent, according to the New Hampshire Bulletin. In the latter case, the educator must report the suspected risk to the local superintendent and deny the parent's request in writing.
Two parents in Maryland are suing Anne Arundel County Public Schools over the school system's policies affirming the gender identity of transgender students.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, was brought by the conservative, anti-LGBTQ legal organization America First Legal on behalf of John and Jane Doe. It accuses staff members at an unidentified county high school of lying to the Does about their child, Mary Doe, and her gender identity.
The Does allege that the school "socially transitioned" Mary by using a masculine name and male pronouns without informing them or obtaining their consent. They are asking school officials to use Mary's given name and female pronouns and a federal judge to declare the district's transgender-affirming policies illegal.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia and Potomac Law Group have filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of two students who say they were denied permission to form a Gay-Straight Alliance at King George Middle School in King George, Virginia.
According to the lawsuit, the lead plaintiff, a seventh-grade student identified by the initials Z.J.W., learned about GSA clubs while researching them at home.
With their parents' support, Z.J.W. contacted a teacher in August 2025, before the start of the school year, and asked her to sponsor a GSA at the middle school.
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