Parents sue school district for referring to their kid with the correct pronouns

A Wyoming couple is suing a school district for using their child’s preferred name and pronouns without their permission.

In their initial complaint, filed in April, Ashley and Sean Willey accused Sweetwater County School District No. 1 of violating their parental rights, freedom of religion, and their family’s privacy by respecting their teenage child’s request to use a male name and pronouns while a student at Black Butte High School in Rock Springs, Wyoming. As the Casper Star-Tribune reported in May, the Willeys allege that school officials concealed information about their child’s gender identity from them for months during the 2021–2022 school year. They claim that after they learned of their child’s request and instructed the school to use their child’s legal name and she/her pronouns, the school continued to use the student’s preferred name and pronouns, per a 2022 district policy.

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In the complaint, the couple’s attorney Henry Bailey Jr. and lawyers with the Georgia-based Child and Parental Rights Campaign wrote that “In facilitating ‘social transitioning’ without informing parents, Defendants are directly interfering with the parent-child relationship by prohibiting parents from exercising their fundamental rights as the primary decision-makers for their children.”

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The Willeys’ are seeking a preliminary injunction banning the school district from using the student’s preferred name and pronouns. They also argue that Ashley Willey, who happens to be a teacher in the district, should be exempt from following the district policy requiring teachers to use students’ preferred pronouns due to her religious beliefs.

Lawyers for the school district characterized the Willeys’ lawsuit as an attempt to force their personal beliefs on the district and “seek their fifteen minutes of fame.” They argued that since the Willeys’ child has since reverted to using their legal name and Ashley Willey has never been asked to use a transgender student’s pronouns at work, the lawsuit has no factual or legal basis. They denied that the district was “facilitating social transitioning” or performing “medical/mental health interventions” and argued that Ashley Willey is seeking to defy other families’ parental rights by not using students’ preferred pronouns. The district’s lawyers also argued that a ruling in the Willeys’ favor would force the district to violate Title IX and federal nondiscrimination laws.

In late June, U.S. District Court Judge Scott Skavdahl sided with the Willeys in blocking part of the district policy requiring school officials to respect the privacy of students in regard to their preferred names and pronouns — potentially requiring schools to out trans and nonbinary students to their parents.

However, Skavdahl agreed with the school district that blocking its policy of respecting students’ preferred pronouns would violate Title IX. As the Cowboy State Daily notes, the U.S. Department of Education requires schools to respect transgender students’ gender identities under Title IX.

Skavdahl also rejected the Willeys’ claims that the school’s policy violates their familial privacy and found that the couple had failed to prove that the school had engaged in active mental health treatment of their child without their consent.

The Willeys have since updated their complaint to focus on parental and religious rights. In the updated lawsuit, filed last month, the Willeys and a private counselor said that their child had shown “symptoms of gender dysphoria” and had been seeing mental health counselors at school, which Ashley Willey claimed the school had concealed from her.