The DoE’s Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO) is specifically looking at whether the MDOE is violating the Family Education Rights Privacy Act (FERPA), which gives parents the right to access their children’s education data. The investigation is prompted by reports that dozens of Maine School districts have policies allowing schools to create “gender plans” supporting a student’s “transgender identity” and then claiming the plans are not education records under FERPA, which makes them unavailable to parents, DoE explained.
“Parents and guardians have the right to access their child’s education records to guide and safeguard their child’s mental, emotional, and physical well-being. Any policy to the contrary is both illegal and immoral,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement.
“A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to meet with several young people who shared their detransitioning stories. It is deeply concerning to hear that teachers and school counselors in Maine are reportedly encouraging and helping students to undergo so-called ‘gender transitions’ while keeping parents in the dark. The Trump Administration will enforce all federal laws to safeguard students and families,” she added.
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The DoE said the investigation, along with a similar one launched on Thursday into California, is part of the administration’s effort to clear a backlog of FERPA complaints that accumulated under the Biden administration. The Biden administration was radically pro-transgender and supported “gender affirmation” and sex changes for minors.
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“Under the previous Administration, we were fighting to protect our children from irreversible ‘sex changes’ – a path too often facilitated by school personnel who we entrusted with our children,” Parents Defending Education (PDE) Founder and President Nicole Neily said in a statement. “We are proud to stand with President Trump and Secretary McMahon to hold school districts accountable and ensure no child is socially transitioned behind parents’ backs by teachers or administrators.”
PDE notably found in 2023 that more than 1,000 school districts across the United States have policies openly stating that district personnel can or should keep students’ transgender status hidden from their parents. That figure includes 18,335 schools with 10,712,558 students.
This is only the newest investigation into the state’s embrace of gender ideology. Last week, DoE concluded in another investigation that MDOE is violating federal civil rights law by allowing boys to play on female sports teams.
The department’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) launched that investigation after a transgender-identifying boy claimed the victory in the Maine Class B championship for the Greely High School girls’ track and field team in February. The high school boy was allowed to compete on the girls’ team, despite Trump’s executive order barring males from participating on female sports teams.
Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.
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