Advocacy groups are fighting back against what they claim as illegal discrimination toward middle and high school student athletes.
An open letter organized by the Women’s Law Project and the Education Law Center sent to Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association, Inc. (PIAA) Executive Director Robert A. Lombardi and PIAA’s board of directors said their decision to rewrite and revise policy and procedure manuals to prohibit transgender athlete participation went against established state and federal laws, a press release said.
The change to PIAA’s policies and procedures were voted on February 19, 2025 in response to Donald Trump’s Presidential Executive Order 14201.
“We care deeply about clarifying and protecting the rights of transgender kids in Pennsylvania. Right now, our next steps are to continue to pay close attention to PIAA policies and work to cut through chaotic and cruel misinformation to inform and support transgender and gender-expansive students. Students who believe their rights have been violated should contact us,” said Elizabeth Lester-Abdalla, a staff attorney with Women’s Law Project and the open letter’s author.
The executive order cuts off federal funding to school districts and educational programs that allow transgender athletes to compete on those teams to which they gender identify.
Students are permitted to play sports specific to their birth gender.
The executive order goes on to require “Mixed Gender Participation” provisions in PIAA’s former “by-laws that address when a student’s sex is questioned.”
“Trans students have a right to play as required by state and federal law,” said Kristina Moon, a senior attorney at the Education Law Center. “The executive order is not law and cannot change existing law. The orders even say on them they do not have the force of law.”
Other groups which signed the open letter to PIAA include The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Pennsylvania, Fairness Pennsylvania, GLSEN – nationwide K-12 gender awareness and anti-bias advocacy group – Planned Parenthood Association of Pennsylvania and Public Education Advocates of Lancaster County.
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Moon said she along with others in the advocacy coalition are monitoring the PIAA order and awaiting a response.
“We are hoping to have a discussion with their council,” she said.
While state and federal interventions can prompt lawsuits and civil action, Moon said local communities have power at the ballot box when school boards and school district policies are deemed unfair and discriminatory by district voters.
“We’ve seen in the last round [of these issues] where school boards were replaced,” Moon said.
She cited voter election turnovers in 2023 in the Central Bucks and Pennridge school districts where majority school board members up for re-election were voted out because of unpopular and discriminatory decisions toward LGBTQ+ communities.
In November, 2023, five Republicans were voted out of their Central Bucks school board seats and replaced with Democrats. The district attracted national attention – and contention – over book banning, anti-LGBTQ+ policies and its treatment of students and faculty.
In the same election year Republican school board directors at Pennridge were replaced by Democrats, Bucks County Beacon reported. The former Pennridge board came under fire for hiring conservative contractor Vermilion Education at a taxpayer cost of $31,499 to act as a curriculum consultant. There were contentious anti-LGBTQ+ policies voted at Pennridge by the same school board.
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Endorsed by the Moms for Liberty, an ultra conservative organization that supports book banning and advocates against any school curricula or programs in support of LGBTQ+ individuals, Vermilion was supported by Republicans on the former Pennridge school board.
Vermilion’s founder Jordan Adams does not have an education degree or teaching credentials. At the time Vermilion was a start-up company based in Michigan. It has subsequently re-registered the business in Florida, according to Network for Public Education.org.
LGBTQ+ civil rights; diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and racial discrimination were among other contentious Pennridge School District issues.
