Oregon Department of Education Wants to Hide Student Gender Identity from Parents

The Oregon Department of Education (ODE) published a guide that encourages schools to hide students’ gender identity from parents. 

The 48-page document, titled “Supporting Gender Expansive Students, Guidance for Schools,” not only pushes gender ideology and queer theory, it also tells schools to hide information from students’ parents when possible.

“To the extent possible, schools should refrain from revealing information about a student’s gender identity, even to parents,” the document from the ODE reads.

The guide also explains that students may be concerned about their parents finding out about their gender identity. It reads:

Students who are not publicly asserting their authentic gender identity may have privacy concerns about students, school staff, community members, or their families finding out before they are ready to share their identity more widely. Parent and family support is the goal when supporting gender expansive students, but may not be possible in all situations.

The guide begins with a letter from Colt Gill, the Director of the Oregon Department of Education and Deputy Superintendent of Public Instruction. Gill complains that over the last year and a half, there’s been a surge of “dehumanizing media coverage against gender-affirming education and healthcare nationwide.”

Gill also calls for a shift away from “tolerance” and “acceptance” towards “respectful, affirming, and celebratory school communities” which openly promote leftist conceptions of sex and gender. 

The guide adds that the term “gender expansive” includes various different identity categories, including “transgender, nonbinary, Two Spirit, intersex, agender, genderqueer, and genderfluid identities.” It also notes that in 2021, the State Board of Education requested that Oregon schools create “safe spaces for LGBTQ2SIA+ students, staff and families through use of symbolism of pride and affirmation across gender identities and sexual orientations.”

The guide encourages school personnel to affirm students’ identification and transition attempts. It reads:

School-based mental health and social health professionals should be prepared to offer additional support to students, since recent national legislative efforts to restrict gender-affirming care and education have had a detrimental effect on gender expansive youth mental health. 

But even more shockingly, the guide offers a specific way in which school personnel may be able to “offer additional support,” suggesting that schools provide “access to gender-affirming clothing.”

In one survey, “Many students named access to gender-affirming clothing (e.g., makeup, binders, clothing, packers, and menstrual products)” as one way the administration could provide support. It goes on to explain:

“After getting approval from the school administration in order to confirm a location in the school for a community closet,” school personnel and student leaders of a pro-LGBT club “partnered with an LGBTQ2SIA+ community based organization and a local library to host a community fundraiser to stock the gender-affirming closet for youth.”

Breitbart News recently reported that the Oregon Department of Education was preparing to spend $2 million on developing pro “LGBTQ2SIA+” curriculum as well as “safer affirming spaces.”

Spencer Lindquist is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @SpencerLndqst and reach out at slindquist@breitbart.com.