District 211 Reaches Settlement With Feds in Transgender Student Case

A transgender student will not be allowed open access to the girls locker room at a Palatine-Schaumburg High School District 211 school following a settlement reached early this morning with federal authorities.

Under the agreement with the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights, the student will continue to be provided a separate changing area within the girls locker room, the Daily Herald reports. The 5-2 vote by the District 211 school board goes against the wishes of the transgender student and basically upholds what the school district has been arguing for months -- it also ensures the school district will continue to receive $6 million per year in federal funds.

Hundreds of people attended the meeting at Conant High School in Hoffman Estates, which started Wednesday evening and continued into early Thursday, with several voicing their disdain in allowing the student, who was born as a male but identifies as a female, any access to the girls locker room, according to the Chicago Tribune. With the settlement, the student agrees to only use private areas of the girls locker room to shower and change.

“The agreement does not require the student to use a privacy curtain. She has said she will do so, but she is not required to use a privacy curtain,” Dorie Turner Nolt, U.S. Department of Education press secretary, told Patch in an e-mail.

• The full agreement can be viewed here.

The debate has put District 211, the state’s largest school district, in the national spotlight after Office of Civil Rights in early November concluded the school district was violating Title IX by not allowing the student full access to the locker room, according to the Chicago Tribune.

The decision, education officials said, was the first of its kind regarding the rights of transgender students, the New York Times reports.

School officials have withheld their opinion during the public debate that they were protecting the privacy of all of its students by not allowing the student full access to the locker room -- even if it was required by federal law. The issue came to light when the student and the student’s family filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights seeking unrestricted access to the locker room at the student’s school.

This agreement reached between the school district and the Office of Civil Rights applies to all students in the district, not just the student who filed the complaint, according to Dorie Turner Nolt, U.S. Department of Education press secretary.

“The district must follow the law, which applies to all students. Through this resolution agreement, the district said it will follow the law. The resolution agreement is clear that under the law, all students must have equal access to school facilities and programs,” Nolt said in an e-mail to Patch. “The district has committed to update its nondiscrimination notice and report gender discrimination and harassment to the federal government.”

Read more on the Daily Herald.

Get Caught up on Our Full Coverage on Patch

• Settlement Could be Reached This Week in District 211 Transgender Case
• District 211: Transgender Student Not Allowed Open Access to Locker Room
• District 211 Transgender Case Making National Headlines
• Local Residents Sound Off on District 211 Decision on Transgender Student
• Fremd Student Starts Petition in Favor of Allowing Transgender Students Access to Locker Rooms
• Mother of Transgender Student Who Was Denied Access to Locker Room Speaks Out