SEC. 2.
The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:(a) All pupils deserve to feel safe, supported, and affirmed for who they are at school.
(b) Choosing when to “come out” by disclosing an LGBTQ+ identity, and to whom, are deeply personal decisions, impacting health and safety as well as critical relationships, that every LGBTQ+ person has the right to make for themselves.
(c) Parents and families across California understand that coming out as LGBTQ+ is an extremely personal decision and want to support their children in coming out to them on their own terms.
(d) Parents and families have an important role to play in the lives of young people. Studies confirm that LGBTQ+ youth thrive when they have parental support and feel safe sharing their full identities with them, but it can be harmful to force young people to share their full identities before they are ready.
(e) Policies that forcibly “out” pupils without their consent remove opportunities for LGBTQ+ young people and their families to build trust and have these conversations when they are ready.
(f) LGBTQ+ pupils have the right to express themselves freely at school without fear, punishment, or retaliation, including that teachers or administrators might “out” them without their permission. Policies that require outing pupils without their consent violate pupils’ rights to privacy and self-determination.
(g) Pupils have a constitutional right to privacy when it comes to sensitive information about them, and courts have affirmed that young people have a right to keep personal information private.
(h) Laws and policies that target or invite targeting of pupils on the basis of gender or sexual orientation are prohibited under state and federal law.
(i) Attacks on the rights, safety, and dignity of transgender, gender-expansive, and other LGBTQ+ youth continue to grow across the country, including here in California. These efforts are having a measurable impact on the health and well-being of LGBTQ+ pupils, and have led to a rise in bullying, harassment, and discrimination.
(j) School policies that support LGBTQ+ pupils and their parents and families in working towards family acceptance on their own terms, without interference from teachers and school staff, build safety and trust within school communities.
(k) (1) Teachers and school staff can provide crucial support to LGBTQ+ young people and can play an important role in encouraging them to seek out appropriate resources and support.
(2) Affirming school environments significantly reduce the odds of transgender youth attempting suicide, according to The Trevor Project Research Brief: LGBTQ & Gender-Affirming Spaces (2020).
(3) LGBTQ+ students with supportive staff at their school experienced a number of positive outcomes, including being less likely to feel unsafe at school because of their gender expression or sexual orientation, or both, and reporting lower levels of depression, according to Joseph G. Kosciw, Ph.D., et al., The 2019 National School Climate Survey: The Experiences of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Youth in Our Nation’s Schools (2019).
(4) Transgender and gender-nonconforming youth with supportive educators had better education outcomes, according to Michelle Marie Johns et al., Protective Factors Among Transgender and Gender Variant Youth: A Systematic Review by Socioecological Level (2018).
(l) School personnel have faced increasing harassment and adverse employment actions because of their lawful efforts to protect pupil privacy, to protect pupils from discrimination, to provide instruction consistent with state standards, and to create a safe and supportive learning environment for all pupils, including LGBTQ+ pupils.
(m) This harassment and adverse treatment of school personnel prevents all pupils from accessing safe and supportive learning environments.
(n) No school employee should suffer an adverse employment action because the employee supported a pupil or pupils in exercising their legal rights to privacy, nondiscrimination, state-aligned instructional materials, and equal educational opportunity.