Transgender student blocked from tennis team sues Va. school district

The 11-year-old is not named in the lawsuit. She is instead referenced by the pseudonym Janie Doe.

The lawsuit comes as states around the country in recent years have passed laws and guidance restricting the rights of transgender students, and lawsuits have been used to challenge the moves. Last month, a federal court blocked the U.S. Education Department from enforcing new Title IX regulations aimed at protecting transgender students in schools as multiple states had filed lawsuits challenging the regulations.

In Virginia, one of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s high-profile moves was rolling back protections for transgender students that had been put in place under former governor Ralph Northam (D). Youngkin’s new “model policies,” which directed students to use school facilities that match their biological sex and made it harder for students to change their name or pronouns at school, became an immediate flash point in Virginia politics.

There were immediate questions about whether the policies violated other preceding protections, like the Virginia Human Rights Act or the ruling in the legal case of Gavin Grimm, who sued his school board for excluding him from the boys’ bathroom at his school because he is transgender.

The ACLU of Virginia in February filed two lawsuits in state court against the Virginia Department of Education on behalf of transgender students, alleging that the policies were discriminatory. Those cases are pending.

One of the state cases involves a Hanover County middle school student and describes experiences and time frames which mirror those in the new federal lawsuit. The ACLU of Virginia declined to say if the same student is involved in both the state and federal cases because the students are referred to by pseudonyms in each lawsuit.

In the case filed July 3 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, the ACLU argues that Hanover County’s decision to bar Janie from the girls’ tennis team was not in line with other organizational practices such as that o the Virginia High School League, which has allowed transgender students to file an appeal to play on the team that matches their gender identity for years.

“School boards have a duty to protect every child’s right to a public education, but by bullying a transgender young person in its district, Hanover County Public Schools are depriving our client of opportunities every public school student should have — and running afoul of federal discrimination protections that Virginia schools are legally required to uphold,” ACLU of Virginia Senior Transgender Attorney Wyatt Rolla said in a statement.

A spokesperson for Hanover County schools, a system in the Richmond suburbs with about 17,000 students, said “a response will be forthcoming in the lawsuit itself” and declined to answer direct questions about the lawsuit.

According to the lawsuit, the student first tried out for her middle school’s girls’ tennis team last summer, after attending six weeks of private lessons and a week-long camp. She and her parents learned she made the team through Schoology, an online tool that the school system uses to give updates to families about their children, the suit said.

But in September, her family received a letter that the county school board wanted to consider whether the 11-year-old should be on the team. The school board said members learned that the student “was born male although now identifies as female” and requested “information in furtherance of your student’s consistent expression as female,” including any medical documentation. The 11-year-old was not allowed to participate in any tennis matches until the school board made a decision.

Her parents called board chair Robert May after receiving the letter. When he returned their call, he asked whether the 11-year-old was born “a biological male,” and added that “that’s really the bottom line,” according to the lawsuit.

In response to the school board’s request, her parents submitted letters from other parents on the team in support of her joining and a handwritten letter from the 11-year-old that said, “I have always been one of the girls.” They included letters from her medical team that affirmed that she underwent a mental health assessment and received a clinical treatment related to her gender identity.

On Sept. 14, May wrote to the girl’s parents that the school board unanimously decided against letting the 11-year-old participate on the girls’ tennis team, according to the lawsuit. He wrote the decision was made “in effort to ensure fairness in competition to all participants.”

The girl pursued playing tennis for a private team.

During an October meeting, the school board began reviewing an extracurricular policy that would follow Youngkin’s model policies by requiring participation based on “biological sex rather than gender or gender identity.” During the meeting, May said the board members were following “a normal, established practice” by changing their policy to follow Youngkin’s guidance. The new extracurricular policy was officially approved in November.

May referred questions from The Post about the lawsuit and school policies to the district.

Across the state, some school divisions, like Fairfax County, rejected the governor’s model policies, while others adopted pieces of the policies or fully adopted them.

The lawsuit states that Janie “felt embarrassed that her participation in athletics with her peers had been the focus of so much attention by powerful adults responsible for the entirety of Hanover County Public Schools.”

A spokesperson from Hanover County Public Schools declined to say how many students have been barred from their desired athletic team because of that extracurricular activity policy.

The Hanover County school board recently considered a request that involved access to locker rooms and participation in extracurricular athletic activities during a closed session on July 9, but there were not more specifics about what that conversation was about on its agenda. Another conversation about the request is scheduled for Aug. 13, according to the school board’s calendar.