Solito continued that her daughter was told this person identifies as a girl, but "she was able to see they were, in fact, anatomically a boy."
The discomfort has nothing to do with how anyone chooses to identify, Solito assured, but has everything to do with being a teenage girl.
"My daughter is kind to everyone and doesn't have a discriminatory bone in her body. But she is a 15-year-old girl who is self-conscious," she explained. "Being a 15-year-old girl, you don't want to change in front of 15-year-old girls, let alone a 15-year-old boy."
To make matters even more awkward, Solito's daughter said the person in question was wearing sunglasses while changing in the locker room, which was odd.
Solito emailed SRVHS principal Whitney Cottrell and "asked her a slew of questions, like 'what are you going to be doing to protect my daughter?'" Solito said. "I wanted to know what the requirements are for a person who wants to change in a bathroom that is different from their gender. What does the school require from the parents or from a doctor?"
"They spent that $1.8 million on equity (liaisons)," she continued. "I thought it was supposed to be equitable across the board. So what are they doing to make sure my daughter feels just as comfortable as this person?"
The response from Cottrell three days later was, according to Solito, "basically a copy-and-paste that said 'We are following the law of AB blah, blah, blah. Here's the answer to all your questions.'"
"She obviously didn't answer my questions," Solito said. "She didn't tell me how she's going to keep my child safe. She doesn't tell me about the sunglasses. She didn't tell me what the school requires. She didn't answer any question that I had about what's actually happening, or how my daughter can feel comfortable."
The state law Cottrell and Solito referenced is AB 1266, the Sex Equity in Education Act, which went into effect in 2014. AB 1266 "requires that pupils be permitted to participate in sex-segregated school programs, activities, and use facilities consistent with their gender identity, without respect to the gender listed in a pupil's records."
"Like all public schools, we must follow the laws," said Ilana Israel Samuels, director of communications and community relations at SRVUSD. "This means we cannot and will not marginalize students from the facilities' access and ignore students' legal rights."
While the district must follow the letter of the law, "If there's a student who says 'I'm not comfortable changing in whatever locker room for whatever reason,' then we're going to work that student and their family," Samuels said, adding that students can change in a bathroom stall in the locker room or other arrangements can be made.
"At the end of the day, we have to allow access to a locker room," Samuels continued, "but we're not going to make a student have to change in a locker room they're not comfortable in."
Solito countered saying, "This current situation is not considering how uncomfortable it makes biological teenage girls in their own locker room. My child should not have to feel uncomfortable in her locker room."
This is a textbook "rock-and-a-hard-place" situation for everyone involved. However, solutions do exist -- better solutions than dozens of girls changing in bathroom stalls.
Those solutions won't be found by giving a copy-and-paste answer to a parent's angst-filled plea for help. Nor will they be found by, basically, saying your hands are tied by the law.
Finding a solution will take honest, respectful communication, with those involved seeking to understand the concerns of the other parties and being open to ideas that might be, well, uncomfortable.
This story contains 677 words.
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