Across Florida, support for LGBTQ+ students is crumpling like gift-bag tissue paper, as state education officials demand that school districts erase protections — many just a few years old, adopted after long and sometimes contentious public debate and heartfelt testimony by students and parents pleading that schools be safe for all students.
The changes LGBTQ+ students and families asked for might have seemed radical at first to school board members — the right to be addressed by the gender they identified with, and use appropriate bathroom and locker-room facilities; the right to be protected from bullies; the chance to use texts and read library books that are inclusive of their experience; the assurance that they have access to the same counseling services and confidentiality that protect heterosexual students.
Yet in district after the district, Floridians saw compassion and dignity win. Even the most conservative school districts — places like deep-red Flagler County — adopted protections to ensure that the fundamental rights of LGBTQ+ students weren’t violated.
