Agency
Department of Education
 
Board
State Board of Education
 
Guidance Document Change: Every day, throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia, educators and school leaders work to ensure that all students have an opportunity to receive a high-quality education. As a part of that work, educators strive to meet the individual needs of all students entrusted to their care, and teachers work to create educational environments where all students thrive. The Virginia Department of Education (the “Department”) recognizes that each child is a unique individual with distinctive abilities and characteristics that should be valued and respected. All students have the right to attend school in an environment free from discrimination, harassment, or bullying. The Department supports efforts to protect and encourage respect for all students. Thus, we have a collective responsibility to address topics such as the treatment of transgender students with necessary compassion and respect for all students. The Department also fully acknowledges the rights of parents to exercise their fundamental rights granted by the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to direct the care, upbringing, and education of their children. The Code of Virginia reaffirms the rights of parents to determine how their children will be raised and educated. Empowering parents is not only a fundamental right, but it is essential to improving outcomes for all children in Virginia. The Department is mindful of constitutional protections that prohibit governmental entities from requiring individuals to adhere to or adopt a particular ideological belief. The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees religious freedom and prohibits the government from compelling speech that is contrary to an individual’s personal or religious beliefs. The Department embarked on a thorough review of the Model Policies Guidance adopted on March 4, 2021 (the “2021 Model Policies”). The 2021 Model Policies promoted a specific viewpoint aimed at achieving cultural and social transformation in schools. The 2021 Model Policies also disregarded the rights of parents and ignored other legal and constitutional principles that significantly impact how schools educate students, including transgender students. With the publication of these 2022 Model Policies (the “2022 Model Policies”), the Department hereby withdraws the 2021 Model Policies, which shall have no further force and effect. The Department issues the 2022 Model Policies to provide clear, accurate, and useful guidance to Virginia school boards that align with statutory provisions governing the Model Policies. See Code of Virginia, § 22.1-23.3 (the “Act”). Significantly, the 2022 Model Policies also consider over 9,000 comments submitted to the Department during the public comment period for the 2021 Model Policies.
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9/28/22  10:48 am
Commenter: Anonymous

The implementation of this policy is not needed and is doing more damage then good
 

The implementation of this new policy seems to have only one goal, the removal of a policy that was implemented before it, now in the document it self it stated that the purpose of it is to make it so everyone is receiving a quality education which is a wonderful goal, but removing the prior policy will not achieve this, if anything it will only cause damage.  There are many other ways to improve the education of all students that doesn’t involve removing the listed policy, such as investing more money in schools for better technology and equipment in the learning environment, I was and still am a student who lives in VA, and as of this moment before and after the implementation of the policy they wish to remove, my education has not been hindered in anyway because of it, my education is hindered by the lack of money I have to buy the required material I need for my classes, with online learning now seemingly a permanent part of our lives, we need the government to divert a large sum of its funding to pay for the required material in a students education, whether it be paying for their college, text books, calculator, online website subscriptions that provide services such as Point Solution, we do not require the government to govern whether or not our friends or family can use the bathrooms/restrooms if their sex is not the same as their gender.  Please try to understand, and if you cannot understand or disagree, then please try to not offend or obstruct purposely, as a government you have a lot to deal with, the government must be tolerant, but they must also be lawful and just, if the government is not lawful or just and is instead governed by our politicians opinions, then who can we truly rely on.  So please try to tolerate people whom tolerate others, in the end, they are good people, and we are all people, and if we are going to implement laws based on how we feel towards a certain matter then listen to how I feel, we are all people, whether we are “good” or “bad” it doesn’t matter, we all deserve to be treated with at least some dignity and respect, no matter the culture, the ideology, the gender, the sex, or the race, we are all human, so let’s get along.

CommentID: 158889