Fairfax County Public Schools has decided to resolve a former student’s lawsuit challenging its policies supporting transgender students before it can reach trial.
The now-graduated student, identified as Jane Doe and represented by the right-wing organization America First Legal, recently accepted the Fairfax County School Board’s offer of a judgment that includes $50 and compensation for legal fees, according to court documents.
By OLIVIA DIAZ Associated Press/Report for America
SALEM, Va. (AP) — René Harvey and her wife arrived at a Roanoke Valley pride celebration in October carrying deep-seated worries about all that could go wrong.
Fairfax County Public Schools is asking an appeals court to accelerate proceedings in its lawsuit over the U.S. Education Department cutting it off from federal funds.
The request filed last Thursday (Oct. 2) came a day after a three-judge panel with the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously denied the school system’s bid to stop the federal government from freezing or canceling any more funds while the case is in court.
The Trump administration is moving forward with a threat to withhold over $3 million in grant funding for Fairfax County’s public magnet schools.
The U.S. Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights gave Fairfax County Public Schools and districts in Chicago and New York City until Tuesday (Sept. 23) to agree to stop giving students access to locker rooms and restrooms corresponding with their gender identity or risk losing funding for specialty magnet schools.
Fairfax County Public Schools is appealing the dismissal of its lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education.
The school system asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit of Virginia yesterday (Tuesday) to overturn a lower court’s decision denying a preliminary injunction that would’ve prevented the Education Department (DOE) from restricting its access to federal funding, Superintendent Michelle Reid announced.
Fairfax County Public Schools has encountered at least a temporary setback in its bid to prevent the federal government from cutting off funding over its support for transgender students.
On Friday (Sept. 5), a federal judge in Alexandria dismissed the lawsuit that the Fairfax and Arlington county school boards had filed against the U.S. Education Department, denying their requests for an injunction to halt the funding freeze as the case proceeds.
Competing rallies outside at Luther Jackson Middle School in Merrifield yesterday (Thursday) quickly commanded attention away from Fairfax County’s first school board meeting of the new academic year.
Dozens of activists from pro-LGBTQ+ group FCPS Pride showed up to applaud the school board for supporting transgender students, while the anti-abortion organization Students for Life of America gathered to condemn Fairfax County Public Schools officials over recent allegations of employees helping students obtain abortions.
The Fairfax County School Board is suing the Trump administration for withholding federal funds in retaliation for its refusal to scrap policies supporting transgender students.
At its meeting last night (Thursday), its first of the new academic year, the school board authorized a lawsuit against the U.S. Education Department alleging that its denial of funds to Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) violates federal laws and the Constitution, Superintendent Michelle Reid announced today.
The Trump administration appears to be following through on its threat to withhold federal funds from public schools in Northern Virginia after they refused to roll back policies that support transgender and gender non-conforming students.
The U.S. Education Department announced yesterday (Tuesday) that it has placed Fairfax County Public Schools and the school systems in Arlington, Alexandria, Prince William and Loudoun on “high-risk status,” a move that it claims lets it attach specific conditions for releasing funding.
Fairfax County Public Schools is joining its counterparts across Northern Virginia in rejecting the Trump administration’s demands that it rescind policies supporting transgender and gender-nonconforming students.
In a message to FCPS staff and families, Superintendent Michelle Reid says she has sent a response to the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) defending the school system’s policies as consistent with existing state and federal law, requesting that the federal government pause any further action until the issue is “clarified” by the courts.
