Hello, and welcome to episode 17 of The Spectrum. This was recorded on May 13, 2025. The topic for today’s episode is the Shenandoah County School Board meeting of May 8th and specifically the January changes the board made to policy INB on teaching about controversial subjects and the proposed changes they were considering in the May meeting.

Here is the current text of policy INB, as it has stood since January. 

The Shenandoah School Board recognizes that preparation for effective citizenship is one of the major purposes of education. The preparation for effective citizenship includes the study of issues that are controversial. Such study is carried out in an atmosphere free from bias, prejudice,or coercion.

In teaching about controversial issues, teachers are expected to:

• Establish a learning environment where each student can study the issues within a curriculum that is appropriate to the student’s knowledge and maturity; and

• Provide instruction in an atmosphere that is free from bias, prejudice, or coercion.

Although the instructional program includes the study of the political party system in the United States, the School Board does not endorse any political party, candidate, or position on controversial matters outside the approved curriculum.

To ensure consistency with these principles, the School Board has established the following policy regarding instruction on Gender Identity:

Gender Identity

“Gender Identity” shall mean or refer to an individual’s self-conception as a male, female, a blend of both or neither. Without limitation, Gender Identity shall be interpreted to mean the teaching of more than two genders or the ability to identify as a gender other than one’s actual biological sex at birth.

Shenandoah County Public Schools shall not provide or allow any employee or third party to provide instruction, guidance, activities, or programming regarding Gender Identity to students enrolled in prekindergarten through 12th Grade.

The January changes were the addition of a ban on teaching about gender. The board voted unanimously, 6 to 0, to implement this change. 

There are many problems with this change. The very first sentence of the January change exposes a major flaw. It claims the January change is to ensure consistency with the guiding principles. But those principles are subverted when no learning is permitted. This is a travesty which boldly asserts something that is obviously false and then pretends that it true.

Second, it misdefines gender identity. Any policy based on an incorrect set of definitions is broken. It conflates sex and gender and speaks about an “ability to identify other than one’s actual biological sex at birth”. This exposes the bias at the heart of this policy. It makes the assumption that this “actual biological sex” is the only real thing and that an “ability to identify” is some fantasy. It send a very clear message that the school board does not believe transgender students. It says “this is just in your head but only biology is real”.

Third, it makes it impossible for a student to reach out for help. This policy could directly lead to the death of a transgender student. Myself and others pointed this out to the board and this seemed to connect with at least some of them.

Finally, and in some ways, perhaps the most important problem is there is no justification of this change. Why is this a forbidden topic? Why is teaching the truth about biology and psychology and the place where the intersect something forbidden? Why is the truth something so terrible that students are not allowed to learn it within the Shenandoah County school system? There is no justification for this in the policy and, as I’ve already said, the ban on the subject is in direct conflict with the first half of the policy.

At the May 8th meeting, they were voting on proposed changes to policy INB.  There were three proposed changes. I won’t read the text of these now but here is a summary. Drafts 1 and 3 made no meaningful changes. 

In the April update, I spoke about how draft 2 provided meaningful change, however by the May meeting draft 2 had changed so that it no longer did this. There was a great deal of debate among the board with some supporting draft 2 and some supporting draft 3. The only meaningful differences between them were that draft 2 permitted some designated classes of personnel to provide appropriate guidance to students while draft 3 did not. There was also a draft 1 of a proposed change but it received no debate or consideration.

The debate began with board member Carlineo spoke about why she supported draft 3. In her comments she spoke her concerns with draft 2. She was afraid that the language in draft 2 would let staff be supportive of transgender students. Her reasoning for this was the it included the phrase “Discussions should remain within the scope of professional responsibilities”. She then made reference to the professional standards of a group that I think she called the “American High School Association” whose professional standards she claimed required being affirming, accepting and respectful”. Carlineo seemed to find that concept distasteful. I went looking for this organization today and I did find an “All American High School Association”. It’s not clear if this was the group she was referring to and I may have jotted the name down wrong in my notes. If this was the group I could find no mention of transgender policy in their webpage but even if she is correct, the superintendent pointed out that the school system was not bound by this policies of another organization. This is another example of Carlineo cherry picking data (I’m assuming she didn’t make it up whole cloth) and misapplying it to try to bolster her argument.

When board member Streett asked if the lawyer had seen the draft 2 policy, the superintendent said that she had and if I heard correctly, that she had either written or at least given legal counsel on the paragraph that was the major addition in this draft.

This information sent Carlneo into a bit of a rant questioning the “politics” of the lawyer and saying that she was trying to sneak progressive ideas in. This is a clear indication of Carlineo herself not operating within the bounds of policy INB where decisions about what is taught are supposed to be made in a non-partisan way. Carlineo was overtly and brazenly partisan.

It was clear that Chairman Barlow had enough of Carlineo when she kept asking the same question and getting a clear response and not wanting to accept it. It was clear that Carlineo felt that any room left for treating transgender people with respect was not appropriate.

Barlow called for a vote on an end to debate on draft 3 and this passed with a 4-2 vote with only Carlineo and Rickard voting to continue debate. They then voted on draft 3 and it failed with the same vote.

They then moved on to draft 2. Since they had already spent at least 40 minutes debating the relative merits of drafts 2 and 3 they went straight to the vote where it passed with a 4-2 majority with only Carlineo and Rickard voting against it. Barlow, Streett, Gutshall and Vance voted for draft 2.

The first half of policy INB remains the same but the section on gender identity now is:

To ensure consistency with these principles, the School Board has established the following policy regarding instruction on Gender Identity.

“Gender Identity” shall mean or refer to an individual’s self-conception as a male, female, a blend of both or neither. Without limitation, Gender Identity shall be interpreted to mean the teaching of more than two genders or the ability to identify as a gender other than one’s actual biological sex at birth. 

Shenandoah County Public Schools shall not provide or allow any employee or third party to provide instruction, discussions, or any other activities regarding Gender Identity to students enrolled in prekindergarten through 12th Grade.

School administrators, counselors, student support specialists, social workers and psychologists may respond to individual student inquiries about gender and gender identity without promoting personal beliefs or advocating for any viewpoint. Discussions should remain within the scope of professional responsibilities, subject to the parental notification requirements in policy GBAB/JFHAB.

Policy GBAB/JFHAB is the policy the permits parents to inform the school of the name and pronouns to be used for their child. Earlier in the year Carlineo tried to have this amended to make it easier to ignore the parents but failed.

I don’t have a problem with this new policy in so far as it doesn’t appear to make things worse, but it also doesn’t appear to make things better. It still bans a subject with no justification. It still misdefines gender identity. It still violates the spirit of the first half of the policy. It still makes it clear the school board does not believe what transgender students are telling them.

The next ban they are likely to take up is the ban on transgender students participating in sports. While nothing is yet on the agenda, there was some discussion and it seemed the sentiment on the board was ready to follow Trump.

Listening to the debate by the school board made a few things clear. 

The school board is very confused about what is means to be transgender. They frequently spoke about “transgenderism” as if it were a religion like Catholicism. This is absurd. There is no transgender religion, no transgender way of life. It is simply a word to describe people whose sex does not align with their gender.  They spent a lot of time being concerned about a thing that isn’t real.

In my comments to the board, I urged them to reach out to the parents of transgender students and to organizations that work with transgender people. Board member Streett may have been responding to my comments when he said that he didn’t want to work with organizations that “promoted transgenderism”.  This is an incredible misunderstanding of what these organizations do.

There is not a single organization I know of that encourages people to be transgender. There are organizations that try to support people that have come out as transgender and their work is to be commended, especially in a world where politicians feel free to spread lies about transgender people. 

I work with the local PFLAG chapter in Woodstock and this group exists primarily as a support and social outlet for the LGBT community. I have never once witnessed anyone encouraging anyone to come out or to be transgender or gay. That’s just not what they do. Organizations like PFLAG work to promote environments where LGBT people can participate as full members of society. That is not “promoting transgenderism” and if someone things it is then what they are saying is they really don’t want anyone to break down barriers to LGBT people being visible.

What Streett and the rest of the board fail to understand is that almost every single LGBT person is self-identified. Nobody makes them gay or transgender. The just recognize that they are. Carlineo’s hostility to counselors being accepting and affirming is appalling. If someone tells you who they are, you should believe them. You should help them figure out if what they think is true really is. Sometimes it might not be. It’s valuable to find that out so that the person can find the right path for them. But, if you don’t accept what they tell you then you can’t help them. It’s that simple.

Acceptance and affirmation are not dirty words. They are the basis for a respectful society where we accept people for who they are and don’t try to force them to be who we want them to be. The idea that someone would groom young people to be gay or transgender is offensive and disgusting. LGBT people aren’t the ones running conversion camps that try to force people to be something they aren’t. Think on that. Who is doing the grooming? 

I’m not accusing anyone on the board of being supportive of conversion camps. But, when you look at the concerns they raise and look at them in the context of the real world and not the fantasy land of delusions they seem to think are true then you realize that policy made in a place where facts don’t matter and where they actively avoid hearing the voices that could help them leads you to a place where LGBT people will be harmed. Comments made by Barlow, Streett and Vance lead me to believe they don’t want that to happen. But, it will, if they don’t allow the people who could help them have a seat at the table. I implore them to have real conversations with people who want to help.

Groups like PFLAG are non-partisan organizations. They do not endorse candidates but only talk about issues. They can help. They want to help but they have the door closed on them every time they ask. The board needs to start listening. Nobody is trying to make kids gay or trans. The only desire is to keep kids safe, healthy, happy and well educated. That is what the board says it wants as well but that isn’t possible without hearing from the voices that can help. They need to stop invoking the Family Foundation who only care about some families and seem to care more about hurting other families than actually protecting anyone.

If you live in Shenandoah County, please write to the board to explain why policy INB should have the ban on teaching about gender removed. You can find a link to the page with the phone numbers and email addresses of the board members in the show notes. You will also find links the the draft policies they considered. The draft 2 version is now the new policy INB.

The last five months have been troubled ones for anyone in the LGBT+ community and I don’t see that changing any time soon, unfortunately. Trump and his Project 2025 crowd continue to defy the court and act in direct violation of the oaths of office they have sworn. It will be up to all of us to stand strong and keep making our voices heard. It’s going to be a tough year but we must stand together and we must not slet hatred push us back into the closet. If you have a story about LGBTQ+ life experience you would like to share, positive or negative or you would be willing to share a coming out story, please contact me at spectrumpodcasthost@gmail.com.

Here are links to the three proposed changes to policy INB they considered:

• Draft 1: https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/shenandoah/Board.nsf/files/DFYM8L59FB56/$file/DRAFT%201%20Policy%20INB%20-%20Teaching%20About%20Controversial%20Issues.pdf Draft 2: https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/shenandoah/Board.nsf/files/DG9Q5A679345/$file/DRAFT%202%20Policy%20INB%20-%20Teaching%20About%20Controversial%20Issues%20with%20Modification.pdf
• Draft 3: https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/shenandoah/Board.nsf/files/DFRGQR44E662/$file/DRAFT%203%20Policy%20INB%20-%20Teaching%20About%20Controversial%20Issues.pdf