Parents in Jefferson County, Colorado are pissed - and rightfully so - after finding out that the teachers union told educators to essentially break the law.
According to CBS Colorado, an email from the Jefferson County Education Association (JCEA) to teachers indicated, "if you do a questionnaire, please make it a paper and pencil activity - any digital records are more permanent and may be requested under federal law.”
JCEA, which has over 5,300 members, encouraged teachers to break the law. Aside from insisting that any questionnaires regarding a child’s gender identity be filled out on paper rather than digitally, the association also told teachers to encourage students not to hold onto the documents in order to keep the information at school.
As Colorado law states, it is prohibited to provide mandatory or voluntary surveys to students asking about things like gender identity unless parents are alerted prior to distribution in case they want to opt-out. As CBS Colorado also reported, this reminder was sent out to employees via an email prior to the start of this school year.
Yet, that didn’t work. One parent, Denice Crawford, was in shock when her young son came home from school with a paper survey asking about his gender identity. She said she felt “deceived, lied to, [and] taken advantage of,” adding that she didn’t feel she “can trust the teachers.”
Crawford herself isn’t anti-LGBTQ. Her daughter is supposedly gay and her nephew identifies as “transgender.” But as she said, “This is not political. It’s just [that] they’re breaking the law.”
A parental rights group in the area called Jeffco Kids First told the outlet that “dozens of teachers have conducted the surveys after their union advised them how to hide evidence.”
This is illegal, and school board member Susan Miller thought the same thing.
“The leadership actually provided an avenue to get around the law and basically saying it was OK,” she said, insisting that the union put teachers’ jobs at risk since those that violate it can lose their license.
Nonetheless, JCEA president Brooke Williams said the following in a statement:
By allowing students an optional avenue to share their preferred pronouns while maintaining student privacy, we can better ensure that students feel safe, respected, and validated. We encourage and support educators to follow Jeffco's district policy which states: School staff shall not disclose information that may reveal a student's transgender status to others, including parents and other school staff, unless legally required to do so or unless the student has authorized such disclosure. Transgender and gender nonconforming students have the right to discuss and express their gender identity and expression openly and to decide when, with whom, and how much to share private information.
Honestly, gender identity isn’t even the main issue here. Instead, it's that the union told teachers to break the law and hide the evidence, which speaks volumes on what it will or won't do in order to indoctrinate kids and drive a wedge between students and their parents.
Schools are not looking out for our kids, and if you still think that, wake up.
