MARLBORO, NJ – The State of New Jersey is suing two school districts after board members enacted a policy that parents must be informed if a child wants to change their name or gender identity in the public school system.
In an effort to block parents from having a say in their child’s decisions, the administration of Phil Murphy is seeking an injunction against those two districts.
Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin announced the filing of complaints by the Division on Civil Rights (DCR) against the Middletown Township, Marlboro Township, and Manalapan-Englishtown Regional Boards of Education. These complaints challenge the allegedly unlawful policies enacted by these boards, which require school staff to notify parents about the gender identity or expression of transgender, gender non-conforming, and gender non-binary students.
Attorney General Platkin and the DCR have also filed emergency motions in the Superior Court, seeking preliminary injunctions and temporary restraints to prevent the implementation of these policies while the DCR’s challenges are pending.
According to the administrative complaints and motions for preliminary injunctions, all three policies violate the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination (LAD) by discriminating against individuals based on their gender identity or expression. The policies specifically target transgender, gender non-conforming, and gender non-binary students by singling them out for different treatment and requiring parental notification for these students while exempting their peers.
The complaints argue that these parental notification policies disproportionately impact transgender, gender non-conforming, and non-binary youth by potentially exposing them to harm and endangering their safety and mental health. The policies also disregard and contradict guidance from the New Jersey Department of Education regarding the confidentiality and privacy of such information.
Attorney General Platkin stated, “In New Jersey, we will not tolerate any action by schools that threatens the health and safety of our young people. Without question, the discriminatory policies passed by these Boards of Education, if allowed to go into effect, will harm our kids and pose severe risk to their safety. Simply put, these policies violate our laws, and we will not relent in protecting our LGBTQ+ community—especially our children—from discrimination.”
In addition to filing administrative civil rights complaints, the DCR is seeking temporary restraints and preliminary injunctions from the Superior Court to prevent the implementation of these policies while the administrative complaints are being resolved. The requested injunctions aim to maintain the status quo during the litigation, ensuring that school officials do not disclose the gender identity or expression of transgender, gender non-conforming, and non-binary students to their parents while the administrative complaints are pending. The requested injunctions do not prevent school staff from informing parents about concerns unrelated to LAD-protected characteristics, nor do they impede compliance with Harassment, Intimidation, and Bullying (HIB) policies or other reporting requirements designed to safeguard students’ safety.
Sundeep Iyer, Director of the Division on Civil Rights, emphasized, “School policies that single out or target LGBTQ+ youth fly in the face of our State’s longstanding commitment to equality. Our laws prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity or expression, plain and simple, and we will not waver in our commitment to enforcing those protections.”
The policies challenged today were enacted on Tuesday, June 20. The Marlboro Board of Education’s policy mandates notifying parents or guardians about any student’s “change in gender identity or expression” and removes the previous requirement to address students by their preferred name and pronoun. It also allows the district to deviate from a student’s preferred name and pronoun if a parent or guardian disagrees with the student’s preference. Furthermore, the new policy eliminates the guarantee that all students can access school facilities according to their gender identity, as provided by the previous policy.
Similarly, the Middletown Board of Education’s policy stipulates that if a student “requests a public social transition accommodation” such as a name or pronoun change, a bathroom or locker room accommodation, or a club or sports accommodation, the school must inform the student’s parents or guardian about the student’s “asserted gender identity.”