Mar. 14—ROCHESTER — Contrary to purported claims that have circulated online about Rochester Public Schools’ guidelines regarding LGBTQ+ students, the district does not prevent parents from knowing the gender identity or other aspects about their own children.

RPS created its list of guidelines in September. It touches on most of the issues that have divided school districts and even broader communities over the last decade — from transgender students’ involvement in sports to bathroom usage to students’ rights to privacy, among other issues.

One thing the document does not do, however, is prevent parents from knowing information about their own children. The guidelines mandate that the district cannot share that information with parents or guardians of other students. It does not prevent the school district from sharing information with the student’s own parents, and in fact requires that school district staff members do so, if asked.

“We are very clear,” Superintendent Kent Pekel said. “If we are in possession of this information and a parent or guardian wants to know, we provide that information.”

The district’s guidelines were called into question last week when the national organization Parents Defending Education posted the district’s document, titled “Rochester Public Schools administrative guidelines for supporting transgender and gender expansive students.” In its social media post, Parents Defending Education described it as “a secret policy that appears to state staff can keep gender identity of students hidden from students.”

The district’s document does state that students have a right to keep their gender identity private from their peers.

Unlike the organization’s social media post, however, the website of Parents Defending Education makes a similarly worded claim, except it uses the word “parents” at the end, rather than “students.”

The headline listed on its website reads: “Rochester Public Schools has secret policy that appears to state staff can keep the gender identity of students hidden from parents.”

That claim, however, is contradicted by the document the organization was discussing. The passage in the district’s guidelines that addresses this question says:

“If a parent or guardian requests information about their child who is under the age of 18, including information about whether the child is transgender or whether their child has asked to use a name, pronouns, restrooms, or locker rooms based on the child’s gender identity rather than sex assigned at birth, a staff member must provide that information to the parent/guardian if the staff member is in possession of that information at the time the request is made.”

The district’s guidelines are based on model policy from the Minnesota School Boards Association. However, Pekel said RPS intentionally deviated from the MSBA version when it comes to information available to parents. Whereas the MSBA version is more ambiguous, RPS chose to specifically state that parents have a right to information about their children.

The MSBA model policy reads “school district personnel shall not disclose information that may reveal a student’s transgender or gender expansive status to others, including parents and other school personnel.”

“If you read (a portion of the MSBA policy) totally literally, it could say we can’t tell a parent. I chose to depart from that,” Pekel said.

Pekel also spoke against the implication that the guidelines are “secret.” He said the district has internal guidelines for any number of things that are not broadcast to the public, such as those relating to MCA scores.

He clarified, though, that the district will provide information to parents if the district has it.

The Olmsted County Chapter of Moms For Liberty said the fact that the district operates on that request-based system is problematic for parents who may be unaware of what their children are going through.

“Moms for Liberty Olmsted County Chapter understands that RPS will provide parents information about their child if they request it. However, If a parent is unaware that their child is dealing with gender dysphoria, they will not know to request such information,” Jeannine Buntrock, chair of Moms For Liberty Olmsted County, said in a written statement. “This would be denying them the opportunity to support their child in dealing with an issue impacting his/her mental and physical health if the school did not reach out to them.”

Created in September 2023, the district’s guidelines have come much later than when many of the questions regarding LGBTQ+ students began to be debated across the country. As far back as 2014, transgender student Gavin Grimm sued to be able to use the men’s bathroom at a high school in Virginia. Although the case was in limbo for years, the U.S. Supreme Court ultimately sided with Grimm in 2021 when it refused to hear the case, letting a lower court’s ruling stand.

Since then, state legislatures across the U.S. have either passed or debated hundreds of bills about LGBTQ+ students.

According to the Minnesota Student Survey, 42.4% of high school juniors in Rochester Public Schools identified themselves as cisgender females, and 49.1% of respondents identified themselves as cisgender males. Meanwhile, 0.9% of students identified as transgender females, and 1.4% identified as transgender males.

Students also had the option to identify themselves in several other ways: 1.7% identified as A-Gender, 1.9% identified as “genderfluid, gender non-conforming, or genderqueer,” 3.8% identified as nonbinary, 3% identified as “questioning/unsure,” and 0.7% identified as “two spirit,” which is a American Indian designation referring to sexuality and gender identity.

Pekel said the district has been reactive in the situation and the guidelines were drafted because situations and questions pertaining to LGBT students kept coming to the threshold.

“We are entirely in reactive mode here,” Pekel said. “Kids are bringing these issues to us. They’re bringing these issues into our schools. This is not us proactively suggesting that students should be thinking about, grappling with or addressing these issues.”