Colorado educators demand CHSAA ban transgender athletes from girls sports

A coalition of Colorado district directors and faculty board members are calling on CHSAA to ban transgender athletes from highschool ladies sports activities.

The affiliation’s authorized counsel indicated in a public assembly on Tuesday that it will not alter its coverage and plans to stay “impartial” on the problem by leaving these selections to member faculties.

On April 14, representatives from 24 faculty districts and constitution faculties wrote CHSAA “with an pressing and resolute demand: the Colorado Excessive College Actions Affiliation (CHSAA) should instantly undertake guidelines and practices to make sure that boys usually are not permitted to compete as ladies in ladies’ sports activities.”

The coalition consists of representatives from larger districts such because the Douglas County College District, Academy College District 20 and Colorado Springs College District 11, in addition to representatives from faculties who usually are not CHSAA members. It desires CHSAA to adjust to President Donald Trump’s “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” executive order that he signed on Feb. 5.

That government order outlined potential penalties for varsity districts and state associations that fail to conform, most notably the rescinding of federal funding.

The week that the president’s government order was declared, CHSAA declined to say if it will change its stance on transgender athletes. At present, below Article 3, Bylaw 300 of CHSAA’s 2024-25 bylaws, transgender athletes can compete in Colorado highschool sports activities “free from illegal discrimination based mostly on sexual orientation and gender identification.”

On Tuesday, throughout the Legislative Council Assembly on the DCSD Legacy Campus in Lone Tree, CHSAA authorized counsel Alex Halpern indicated Article 3, Bylaw 300 wouldn’t change. Halpern addressed the letter and mentioned the problem of transgender athletes in ladies sports activities is one which CHSAA desires to “keep a impartial place” on.

“Our place is, and has been, that in the end the willpower of who’s going to be eligible to take part on a specific interscholastic workforce at a specific faculty is a choice to be made by that faculty, as guided by its board of schooling and in step with the principals of native management of schooling, together with eligibility for athletics,” Halpern mentioned.

Within the April 14 letter to CHSAA, the undersigned faculty district directors and faculty board members known as the implications for CHSAA not following Trump’s government order “unmistakable.”

“By sustaining insurance policies that allow boys to compete as ladies, CHSAA dangers exposing Colorado faculties to federal investigations, the potential lack of crucial funding, and authorized legal responsibility below Title IX,” the letter learn.

“Past compliance, nonetheless, our demand is rooted in a basic dedication to our feminine college students. Ladies’ sports activities exist to supply equitable alternatives for competitors, achievement, and private development — alternatives which can be undermined when organic males, with inherent bodily benefits, are allowed to take part.”

The coalition desires CHSAA to revise its bylaws to limit participation in ladies sports activities to college students who’re “biologically feminine;” set up clear eligibility standards and verification processes for participation in ladies sports activities; and supply steerage to member faculties on implementing adjustments which can be in step with President Trump’s government order.

Halpern mentioned CHSAA doesn’t view the April 14 letter as communication from the affiliation’s membership, as a result of the letter was despatched by a group of particular person educators moderately than with the backing of complete districts. In regard to the most important faculty district represented within the letter, Douglas County College District — whose board president Christy Williams and board secretary Becky Myers each signed the letter — there has already been pushback from one other faction inside that district.

DougCo Collective, which describes itself as a “consortium of engaged and anxious residents working to carry up these vital (equitable) ideas for Douglas County College District,” launched a press release condemning the involvement of Williams and Myers.

“Publicly endorsing exclusionary insurance policies, particularly ones that concentrate on already weak college students, undermines that dedication (to all college students) and may have long-term results on belief and feeling a way of belonging within the district,” a part of the assertion learn.

Halpern mentioned CHSAA doesn’t acquire details about the participation of transgender athletes.

“We don’t know, it’s not our enterprise to know,” Halpern mentioned. “And we don’t inquire. It’s a neighborhood district resolution and it’s a privateness subject for the scholars.”

Halpern mentioned CHSAA will reply to the April 14 letter, however that “just isn’t inside our authority” to fulfill the letter’s calls for.

“We can not make selections that we imagine, by regulation and by the Colorado structure, are reserved to the member faculties,” Halpern mentioned. “We intend to carry to that place and see what kind of directives come from individuals with significantly extra authority than CHSAA has over the matter of scholar gender identification.”

Ought to CHSAA proceed to defer decision-making on the problem to the native stage, the affiliation may discover itself below investigation by the Trump administration.