Mairead Elordi – September 30, 2021
A teacher training for a Texas public school district directed teachers to hide information about students’ gender identity from their parents in order to make school a “safe” place.
Teachers at Leander Independent School District north of Austin received a training presentation in October last year that instructed them to discuss gender identity with students and ask them whether it was okay to share students’ preferred pronouns with their parents.
The training, titled “Supporting LGBTQ+ Youth in Schools,” was led by two school social workers working for the district, Felix Barnhart and Monica Kelly, who describes herself as a “fat-positive, sex-positive therapist.”
“Add your pronouns wherever your name is published and then also whenever you are introducing yourself, just to normalize the sharing of pronouns,” Kelly suggested to participants in the training.
Another idea, she said, is to “let students identify themselves on the first day of class with their individual name and pronouns,” and make sure to inform substitute teachers and anyone else visiting the classroom of their correct pronouns, “so that way it protects that student from being misgendered or called a name that they don’t identify with.”
“We kind of do this already for students who have nicknames,” Kelly remarked. “We’re just asking to extend that courtesy to students whose gender identity may be different from their sex assigned at birth.”
However, in her next breath, Kelly appeared to admit that pronouns are much more sensitive than nicknames, encouraging teachers to ask students whether it is okay to refer to them by their preferred pronouns when speaking with their parents.
“May I use these pronouns when I contact home?” reads a question on a form Kelly suggested teachers have students fill out.
Another question reads, “Would you like to follow up with me in a private conversation about your pronouns?”
“A student may be out at school, but they may not be out to their parents,” Kelly explained.