A lot has been happening with respect to Family Life Education and gender identity policies in schools around the country over the last few years. Just over seven months ago a parent in Arlington County discovered that a Transgender & Gender Non-Conforming Student Policy Implementation Procedure (J-2 PIP) was on the table at Arlington County Public Schools (APS). The only people aware of it in February (2019) seem to have been APS administrators and activists from Arlington Gender Identity Allies, the group who demanded the policy in September 2018, and carried out its quiet development in cahoots with APS via a private, 30-email conversation.
Controversial Books at APS
We note in the email excerpt above (obtained by FOIA request and dated October 31, 2018) that Pam McClellan, the supervisor of counseling at APS, sought out recommendations from the Arlington Gender Identity Allies for transgender books to be shelved in APS schools.
The Arlington Parent Coalition contacted Deborah DeFranco, Supervisor of P.E., Health, & Family Life Education, about these books. She had this to say regarding books such as I Am Jazz and Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out (and other similarly themed books):
"Books [like these] are used in the counselors' offices for helping kids who express these issues, but they are not in the classrooms or libraries.”
Ms. DeFranco expressed ignorance of the fact that such books are not only housed in classrooms and libraries, but have also been added to student reading lists in some classes.
During a J-2 PIP meeting Maureen Nesselrode, principal at Campbell Elementary School, affirmed to the members of her working group that, “Elementary principals are working hard to get transgender books into libraries and classrooms.”
To this information Ms. DeFranco responded, "We're going to be diligent about these books this year [2019-20]. Parents have the right to opt-out, preview it, and ask how these are going to be used." We hope this is true.
If your children bring home books that you find morally questionable, please contact APC to let us know.
Family Life Education & Opt-Outs
But back to parental opt-outs.
Two circumstances at APS render the standard Family Life Education (FLE) opt-out procedure ineffective:
Sexuality and gender training are no longer restricted to FLE units, but are being diffused throughout core classes as well as in other academic and extracurricular curricula.
APS has not provided parents access to much of the actual curriculum, materials, and or presentations being shown to students, so parents cannot make informed decisions about FLE in APS. This violates Virginia Department of Education FLE standards.
For these reasons the Arlington Parent Coalition strongly recommends that parents who have any questions or concerns about what’s being taught to their children regarding human sexuality, sexual orientation, gender identity, family composition, and/or sexual health and responsibility submit a Universal Opt-Out Letter, informing APS that no instruction or materials on these subjects should be provided to the child named in the letter.
Parents who have concerns about how to provide instruction on sexuality at home may find these resources helpful:
The Care & Keeping of You (Girls, Volumes 1 & 2, from American Girl Doll)
Preparing for Adolescence (For Boys or Girls, by James Dobson)
The Story of Me (Book Set by Navpress)
Parents’ & Children’s Rights
More than ever parents need to understand what rights they retain when sending their children to public school. Organizations like the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), GLSEN (formerly the Gay, Lesbian, & Straight Education Network), the National Educators Association (NEA), and Planned Parenthood are pushing forward policies to give schools greater authority over children than have those children’s parents and guardians, but at present the Federal Educational Rights & Protection Act (FERPA) still safeguards parents’ authority over children’s privacy and information.
The Children & Parental Rights Campaign may be helpful toward understanding what rights the school has over our children, and what rights they do not have.
All LGBTQ+, All the Time
If it seems like there’s a plethora of rainbow festivals in schools lately, that’s not an illusion. Children attending public school will be invited (more accurately "compelled”) to celebrate all things LGBTQ+ up to and exceeding 15 times in a school year.
Is there any other topic that gets this much coverage during the school day?
If anyone is able to go to a school and count up the posters, fliers, announcements, and curriculum time spent promoting sex and gender, the Arlington Parent Coalition would be interested in documenting those numbers. An HB Woodlawn parent tried and lost hope of ever finishing the task after counting fifteen posters featuring rainbows and trans flags in just one classroom.
But It’s Not ALL, or Even Most of the Teachers Who Are Pushing This
Rebecca Friedrichs was a teacher in California for 28 years. She says that “most teachers [are] disturbed about unions’ push for sexualization and indoctrination of school children,” and “America’s real teachers have been silenced and bullied by the very organization[s] that [are] pushing the sexualization of children, that is labor union[s]… who masquerade as teachers and who masquerade as experts. They are neither.”
(Friedrichs’ presentation runs 1:02:00-1:23:30)
The Lawsuits Have Begun In the Other Direction
Peter Vlaming, a French teacher at West Point High School in Virginia was fired in December for insubordination because he elected to avoid using a student’s preferred pronoun. He is now suing his district.
“Mr. Vlaming explained to the school that, as a Christian, he believes that God made humans male and female, and that a girl cannot become a boy. He tried to work with the school. He agreed to call the student by her new masculine name. He asked permission to avoid pronouns altogether when speaking about the student in her absence.
“But to use a false pronoun was to deny God's purposeful design, and that he could not do… ‘I did agree to use the new masculine name [and] to avoid female pronouns,’ said Vlaming, but ‘I won't use male pronouns with a female student.’ Peter Vlaming was fired not for saying the wrong thing, but for refusing to say the wrong thing.”
No Tolerance from the Zealots of Tolerance
The Family Research Council has put out a useful guidebook on what’s inside the Teaching Tolerance program. Schools are couching LGBTQ+ issues under the guise of anti-bullying. But as you may have already discovered, anyone who doesn’t fall in line with the transgender narrative quickly becomes the bullied. There is no tolerance for any viewpoint that disagrees with the ideology that one can be born in the wrong body.
Is Comprehensive Sexuality Education Coming to APS?
Finally, Arlington Parent Coalition asked Deborah DeFranco (who, if you remember, is the head of Family Life Education at APS), “Is APS considering implementing the SIECUS Comprehensive Sexuality Education guide?”
The Comprehensive Sexuality Education guide was launched in California for Family Life Education. The list of egregious problems with this curriculum is outlined here. (Of note, over 34,000 kids left public schools in California during the 2018-19 school year. This year’s figures are not yet available.)
To APC’s question Ms. DeFranco responded, "We're not looking at that yet."
Ms. DeFranco did not ask for clarification about the materials to which APC referred, nor did she indicate that such materials were considered unacceptable for Arlington’s children.
In other words, the J-2 PIP was only the beginning. We have a long road ahead of us toward taking back our schools.
[UPDATE/CORRECTION, April 25, 2020: It was brought to our attention that California does have an opt-out for sex ed, though what is included under the umbrella of sex ed has some ambiguity in interpretation. Therefore APC deleted a reference above to California not allowing opt-outs. We apologize for our error.]
In Conclusion
Arlington Public Schools are no longer a safe place for children whose families hold to traditional or even conventional standards regarding sexuality and personhood. Parents must exercise constant vigilance over what is happening at school, and take measures to ensure that their children are not part of the sexuality social experiment being funneled into schools from organizations like the NEA, GLSEN, HRC, and Planned Parenthood.
If the Arlington Parent Coalition can assist you with more information, connect you with other like-minded parents in your school(s), and/or help you navigate this increasingly egregious affront to parents’ rights, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
Thank you for all you’re doing to help steer APS back into its lane and protect all our children.