CBSD advances anti-inclusive sports participation policy

Written By C.B. Quoyle

During the August 9th policy meeting Central Bucks Policy Committee presented proposed policy 123.3 “Sex-Based Distinctions in Athletics” relating to restrictions to transgender students’ participation in school sports. The proposed policy states all students must now compete according to their sex assigned at birth.

This simplistic approach appeals to some people’s desire for clarity, but we believe it could do grave harm to many students, not merely transgender people, and it denies reality in two ways: first, that sex often fails to fall squarely in one of two columns; and second, that transgender girls are girls and transgender boys are boys.

We assert that ALL students have the right to equal participation in sports and we must work to find ways to serve all athletes in the best ways possible.

We know that many Americans’ first instinct is to believe that transgender athletes should only be allowed to compete on sports teams that match their sex assigned at birth. We acknowledge that it’s a complicated issue, and while some are concerned about fairness to cisgender girls, there is good research that shows cisgender girls are not harmed by transgender girls participation.

We believe a closer look at the issue reveals that supporting ALL the kids can be the safest and fairest way.

Sports are part of education. We fear that banning trans girls from girls’ sports poses a grave and discriminatory risk, a slippery slope of viewing some students as more worthy than others. We must protect girls’ rights to compete on fair playing fields while also protecting the health and safety of ALL students.

We call on CBSD to work together to offer the important benefits of sports—community, connection, social, emotional, physical, and cognitive development—for all young people including transgender youth, who want to participate on the team according to their gender identity, which is who they are, not their sex assigned at birth, which is who they are not.

The issue of transgender athletes, as small as it is, provides perfect grounds for our community to prove that we do not make policy before we gather all the facts; that we do not tune one another out and force our will upon those who disagree; that we vow to use our creativity and the research available to make policy that helps ALL the kids.

Before we dive in, we’d like to note the following:

  • It’s been reported that Policy 123.3 was written by the Independence Law Center, a religious liberty law firm with ties to anti-LGBTQ groups and follows a presentation to the board last November from Greg Brown, a professor in exercise science at the University of Nebraska, in support of prohibiting transgender student athletes from playing on teams that match their gender identities.

  • However, there are several athletic and legal organizations that were not consulted, including National Federation of State High School Associations, Women’s Sports Foundation, National Women’s Law Center, and The Center for American Progress, among others, that provide good guidance on how to ensure equal, fair, respectful, and legal access for ALL athletes.

  • We do not know if anyone in the CBSD athletics department was consulted.

  • We do not know if there are any transgender athletes in CBSD.

  • We do not know if any parents of trans children were consulted.

  • Forthcoming changes to Title IX regulations are expected soon and will likely clarify for the first time that “sex discrimination” includes discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

  • The Education Law Center criticized CBSD’s proposed policy warning it risks violating Title IX and that the policy “considers only ‘reproductive biology and genetic makeup’ and calls gender identity ‘irrelevant’ ignores the science and reinforces harmful, discriminatory stereotypes about trans people.”

  • ACLU PA tweeted: “The ACLU of Pennsylvania will continue to stand up for every student's right to be their full, authentic selves. That includes participating in school athletics.”

Central Bucks already has several highly unpopular, unfriendly, and exclusionary policies—including banning symbols of inclusion, targeting books, and restricting teachers’ ability to call students by their requested name and pronouns—that alienate many students. Add to this list the newly proposed transgender sports ban and you have a district that appears unwelcoming to trans kids.

There are important benefits of equal participation in sports for all young people, including transgender youth.

Yet four common myths are used to deny transgender students the ability to participate equally in athletics. 

For debunking, we turn to the ACLU:

MYTH: Trans athletes’ physiological characteristics provide an unfair advantage over cis athletes.
FACT: Trans athletes do not have an unfair advantage in sports.

Trans athletes vary in athletic ability just like cisgender athletes. One high jumper could be taller and have longer legs than another, but the other could have perfect form, and then do better. One sprinter could have parents who spend so much money on personal training for their child, which in turn, would cause that child to run faster.

“A person’s genetic make-up and internal and external reproductive anatomy are not useful indicators of athletic performance,”according to Dr. Joshua D. Safer.

MYTH: The participation of trans athletes hurts cis women.
FACT: Including trans athletes will benefit everyone.

Many who oppose the inclusion of trans athletes erroneously claim that allowing trans athletes to compete will harm cisgender women. This divide and conquer tactic gets it exactly wrong. Excluding women who are trans hurts all women. It invites gender policing that could subject any woman to invasive tests or accusations of being “too masculine” or “too good” at their sport to be a “real” woman.

Further, this myth reinforces stereotypes that women are weak and in need of protection.

MYTH: Sex is binary, apparent at birth, and identifiable through singular biological characteristics.
FACT: Trans girls are girls.

Girls who are trans are told repeatedly that they are not “real” girls and boys who are trans are told they are not “real” boys. Non-binary people are told that their gender is not real and that they must be either boys or girls. None of these statements are true. Trans people are exactly who we say we are.

There is no one way for women’s bodies to be. Women, including women who are transgender, intersex, or disabled, have a range of different physical characteristics.

“A person’s sex is made up of multiple biological characteristics and they may not all align as typically male or female in a given person,” says Dr. Safer. Further, many people who are not trans can have hormones levels outside of the range considered typical of a cis person of their assigned sex.

When a person does not identify with the sex they were assigned at birth, they must be able to transition socially — and that includes participating in sports consistent with their gender identity. According to Dr. Deanna Adkins, excluding trans athletes can be deeply harmful and disruptive to treatment. “I know from experience with my patients that it can be extremely harmful for a transgender young person to be excluded from the team consistent with their gender identity.”

MYTH: Trans students need separate teams.
FACT: Trans people belong on the same teams as other students.

Trans people have the same right to play sports as anybody else. When a school or athletic organization denies transgender students the ability to participate equally in athletics because they are transgender, that condones, reinforces, and affirms the transgender students’ social status “othered” who deserve the hostility they experience from peers.

We want to see trans-inclusive policies, not trans-exclusive policies.

While we know this is a more than typically complicated issue, seeming to pit the needs of one set of our children against the needs of another, there is research to show that inclusive teams support ALL athletes and encourage participation.

As noted in GLSEN’s 2019 National School Climate Survey, almost 60 percent of transgender youth reported avoiding gym/physical education class, almost 70 percent reported avoiding school locker rooms, and more than 80 percent reported avoiding bathrooms at school due to safety concerns.

These findings highlight the reality that many transgender students attend schools in unsafe or unwelcoming environments, which is exactly why we should advance policies and programs that reduce transphobia, increase acceptance, and improve mental health and well-being among transgender youth.

Our schools are for ALL the kids, every single one of them. And our schools offer everything they can to every student, in the hope that each and every one will find what they love, what helps them to thrive, what opens the door for them to reach their highest potential.

For many students, sports are that open door, as Dr. Lucabaugh outlined in his remarks at the school board meeting last Tuesday.

We don’t have all the answers, but we call on our community to resist stereotypes and go beyond what we think we know and learn more.

With more information, research, and conversation we know we can find a way to support ALL the athletes in CBSD. Trans kids, like ALL kids, deserve equal opportunity and access to sports consistent with their gender identity in an equal, fair, respectful, safe, welcoming and inclusive environment.

Here are some resources for further reading:

C.B. Quoyle

In 1993, Annie Proulx’s novel The Shipping News was published and won the Pulitzer Prize. It tells the story of a newly widowed man who has never known any luck or much love, who moves to Newfoundland with his aunt and two young children. There he finds a home. He writes for the local newspaper and because he’s a good listener and sensitive writer, he is awarded his own column: “The Shipping News.”

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