Families sue feds, Minnesota school district for violating student privacy

MINNEAPOLIS – Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys representing a group of students and parents filed suit Wednesday against the U.S. Department of Education, the U.S. Department of Justice, and Minnesota’s Virginia Public Schools for disregarding student privacy and safety. The school district is located just over 60 miles north of Duluth.

The district opened its schools’ locker rooms, showers, and restrooms to the opposite sex after the U.S. departments of Education and Justice threatened removing federal education funding throughlegally baseless directives it issued to public schools in May. Concerned students and parents then formed the group Privacy Matters to challenge the guidelines and the school district’s policy. Young female students, initially unaware that the district was allowing biologically male students to use the girls’ locker room, were shocked and alarmed when a male student began using the locker room and have now have no assurance that they may use girls-only facilities without a male entering the once-private locker rooms and restrooms.

“School policies should promote the rights and safety of every student, but that’s not what Virginia Public Schools is doing—and it’s certainly not what the departments of Education and Justice are doing,” said ADF Senior Counsel Gary McCaleb. “No child should be forced into an intimate setting, like a locker room, with someone of the opposite sex. Telling girls that their privacy and modesty don’t merit a private and secure changing area is an attack on women. The school district should rescind its privacy-violating policies, and the court should order the DOE and DOJ to stop bullying school districts with falsehoods about what federal law requires.”

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