‘Do not contact their parents’: Texas school district trained staff to hide gender identity disclosures from parents 

A records request in Texas turned up training materials instructing school district staff to keep students’ gender identity secret from their parents.

Local resident Michelle Evans, who is a local leader with Independent Women’s Network, submitted the public records request to Round Rock Independent School District that revealed training about how staff should respond if a student “comes out” to them “as transgender or non-binary.”

“Parents across Round Rock ISD have long suspected that trainings and professional development presentations were being offered within the district to guide staff on gender identity ideology,” Evans told The Lion. “This was based on whispers throughout the community about anonymous teachers and counselors speaking out.”

The materials prompted staff to ask questions such as “Should I call you by this name and pronouns in-front of your parents?”

Staff were also told to use responses such as “Thank you for sharing your identity with me,” and ask, “What is your chosen name and pronouns?” 

The training also emphasized what school employees should not do when a student “comes out” to them. 

“You should not out trans students to other students or staff members,” reads one slide.  

In large letters, it continued, “DO NOT contact their parents and out them to their families.”  

The slide warns doing so could be “potentially dangerous and could be long-term damaging for the student.”

Evans also shared a video linked in the training, called “Advice for Teachers of LGBT Students,” which included teachers discussing “forgoing graduation ceremonies because the cap and gown wasn’t inclusive of their identity,” ending gender-based activities altogether, and stories of students who “came out” to them. 

“Some of our former students have given us a wish list,” one teacher said. “One of [the items was] don’t have gender-based activities. You know, boys over here, girls over here.”  

The same teacher said she saw it as a “gift” when a student said she was lesbian in her seventh grade sex-ed class. 

“I got to see this young woman a year or so later, and it was just a gift,” she said. “You know, you can go your whole career and never get a gift like that.” 

Additional slides showed cartoons of the “Pronouns Do’s and Don’ts” and warned of “accidentally misgendering someone.”  

After the public information request, Round Rock initially tried to prevent Evans from making her discovery public, she says, but they sent the documents after she insisted the district get the state Attorney General’s opinion.  

“But outside of that interaction, I have not asked RRISD for any statement,” she wrote on X. “Historically they have stonewalled parents.”  

Evans told The Lion that the “Names and Pronouns slides” prove the district has been “undermining the rights of parents” and telling staff to “violate laws about withholding information from students’ parents.” 

“Gender dysphoria or the exploration of ideas about gender identity is an issue that deserves a parent’s attention so that the family can seek guidance that aligns with their values, but schools across the nation are interfering with students’ development by instead choosing an ideologically motivated path for children without parental consent,” Evans said.