Fairfax County Public Schools Waffles on Transgender Regulations

A hot-button issue for Fairfax County Public Schools has been relegated to the bin of calculated uncertainty and skittish implementation.

We're taking about transgender students and how best to accommodate them during the school day.

Bottom line: If they have to go to the restroom, to which restroom do they go?

Despite the fact that the county's school board last year approved rules that add gender identity to its nondiscrimination policy, the aforementioned question still looms.

As such, the school board more or less punted.

It cancelled a scheduled meeting on the issue, which was to have been held Thursday, and instead deferred to the U.S. Supreme Court, which has before it a case in which the Gloucester County, Va., school board wants to block a transgender teen (born a girl but now identifies as a boy) from using the men's room.

Thus the wait-and-see delay tactic. Listen to FCSB chief Sandy Evans.

“While the regulation is temporarily on hold, Policy 1450 remains in effect, and the Board remains committed to this policy of nondiscrimination,” Evans said in a release. “Consistent with the policy, and current practice, FCPS continues to accommodate the needs of transgender and gender non-conforming students in a way that protects the dignity and privacy of all students.”