A Manhattan school board has rescinded a vote last year that propelled New York City into the fractious debate over transgender youth in American athletics.
The Community Education Council for public school District 2 — which includes some of the city’s wealthiest and most reliably Democratic neighborhoods — passed a measure in late March 2024, asking the city education department to review its policies on trans girls in school athletics.
The effort was driven in part by Maud Maron, a parent and conservative leader in city education circles. In January of 2024, she told Gay City News that she was a member of Moms For Liberty, a group known for its efforts to ban books in American schools that embrace or acknowledge the LGBTQ+ community.
The resolution, which passed in March of that year, argued the presence of trans students in school sports would put other girl athletes at a competitive disadvantage.
It pointed to the city’s history of gender inequality for female athletes over more than a century. The group noted that as recently as 2009 the New York Civil Liberties Union threatened to sue the city Department of Education for scheduling girls’ soccer in spring, while boys played in fall — giving boys more opportunities for scholarships and development, according to the resolution.
The education councils are influential but are essentially advisory, and former Schools Chancellor David Banks immediately rejected the proposal. But even the passage of the resolution came as a surprise to many.
Amy Nagopaleen — a writer, activist and mother of a trans student in the city’s public school system — said Friday that the concern over trans girls in sports was manufactured.
“There’s actually no problem in the public schools,” she said in an interview. “There are no complaints about trans athletes at any of the schools. No one ever came forward to publicly say that they were treated unfairly or displaced by a trans athlete.”
After more than a year of protests, and another school board election, the same council — which ousted some of its previous members after the backlash — voted to rescind the resolution altogether on Wednesday, with a seven-to-three vote and two abstentions.
“It wasn’t really us convincing the people who voted for it, it was an infusion of new blood on the council that got us to finally rescind it,” said Gavin Healy, who has been a part of the council for years.
Healy, a lecturer at Columbia University, said the bulk of the Manhattan district supports the trans community. But he also recognized the debate would not end with this week’s vote.
“I think it’s indicative of other problems we have in our society, and in our country, today,” Healy said. “This isn’t the last attack we’ll see.”
Chyann Tull, a spokesperson for the city’s education department said the city “has always been dedicated to supporting and affirming students of every gender identity, across our school communities.”
Tull added, “We will continue to focus on maintaining safe, inclusive, and welcoming environments for every student.”
Following the backlash from the resolution, Nagopaleen, and other members of the organization Aunties and Friends for Liberation, began mobilizing to get more people to vote in local education council elections throughout the city.
“It was an unpopular resolution — most parents didn’t know it had been passed, “ she said. “But community education councils are almost invisible in city politics.”