Senate File 418 was signed into law by Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds on Feb. 28, which removes gender identity from the Iowa Civil Rights Code, and went into effect on July 1. All Iowa School Districts have to comply with this new state law; however, some school districts have decided to challenge, it including Urbandale who kept gender identity in their school policy.
Recently the Council Bluffs School Board had a meeting about these other schools who are challenging this policy. They discussed a vote, but no official votes have been scheduled.
As of now, the district has decided to not change their policy on bullying due to the current protections in the Iowa Civil Rights Code which includes these protected characteristics: “Color, Marital Status, Mental Disability, National Origin, Physical Disability, Race, Religion, Retaliation, Sex, Sexual Orientation, Mental disability, Age, Family Status, Marital Status.”
Council Bluffs Community Schools doesn’t specify types of bullying in their policy. “We classify it as you’re being bullied or harassed, not why,” Chief of Student Family Services for Council Bluffs Schools, Tim Hamilton said to KETV 7 in a recent interview.
However, the ACLU of Iowa has concerns about the bill and commented that “they did so specifically to allow discrimination—including by the state of Iowa itself—against transgender people, a very small minority of people in Iowa.”
The Board of Education President Jared Tripp has said the Board has approached the policy with great caution.
“This topic has been thoroughly discussed – both prior to the policy change and again during this week’s board meeting work session,” Tripp said. “The board approaches policy changes with great care, ensuring that any updates are clearly justified and appropriate before moving forward with a vote.”
Currently the district does not expect any budget changes from challenging this policy, whether the vote passes or not President Tripp continued “At this time, I do not anticipate any impact to the district’s budget based on our current policy.”
