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Some Michigan parents and community members sharply criticized the State Board of Education Tuesday about a proposed health education standards update they say will strip parents of their rights to opt their children out of lessons that don’t align with their children’s religious upbringing.
But officials at the Michigan Department of Education said parents can continue to opt their children out of sex education lessons. That opt-out provision is in state law.
This is the first update to Michigan’s health education standards since 2007, and people who spoke against it were most concerned with the addition of standards on gender identity for students in grades 6-8.
“This is not biology; it’s ideology,” John Grossenbacher of Clinton Township said of the proposed sex education standards. “These lessons promote gender theory and sexual identity discussions that belong in the homes guided by parents’ faith and values, not in classrooms.
But state education officials say the updated standards maintain a parent’s rights to opt their children out of sex education lessons.
Education officials also noted that local school districts can make individual decisions about how they incorporate the standards once they’re adopted. That means districts don’t have to align their curriculum on health and sex education with the standards.
These are among the standards speakers took issue with:
- Define gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation, and explain that they are distinct components of every individual’s identity.
- Explain how biological sex, gender identity, and gender expression are distinct concepts and how they interact with each other.
- Explain that romantic, emotional, and/or sexual attractions can be toward an individual of the same gender and/or different gender(s), and that attractions can change over time.
- Analyze the similarities and differences between friendships, romantic relationships, and sexual relationships and discuss various ways to show affection within different relationships.
- Describe how sexual health values and priorities may change with age, maturity, knowledge, and responsibilities.
Pamela Pugh, the president of the elected eight-member state board, said in a statement that politicians, media, and advocacy groups “have spread falsehoods to scare parents into thinking that schools would teach sex education to their children without giving parents a chance to opt out from the instruction. Nothing could be further from the truth.”
She reiterated that at the state board meeting Tuesday afternoon.
The update includes standards for both health education and sex education, which has led to concern from some about weaving the two together. An MDE official said that the two were part of the same package of standards in 2007.
The board first heard a presentation on the proposed update during a September meeting. Friday was the deadline for the public to provide feedback. Interim State Superintendent Sue Carnell, answering a question at the end of the lengthy meeting about the timeline, said the intent had been to bring the standards to the board for a vote in the next two months, but she said she will now “meet with the team” to reassess.
Grossenbacher was one of dozens of people who spoke in person at the monthly meeting of the State Board of Education in Lansing. The public comment period lasted more than two hours, and about 20 more people were in line to speak virtually, but the board voted to delay those comments until later in the meeting.
Some invoked the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Mahmoud vs. Taylor case, in which the court sided with religious parents who sought the right to opt their children out of LGBTQ+ inclusive instruction. Their district in Montgomery County, Maryland, had prevented such an opt-out for LGBTQ+ inclusive storybooks. Chalkbeat reported earlier this year that the court said preventing opt-outs interfered with a parent’s right to direct the religious upbringing of their children.
Matt Wilk, a former school board member in Northville, said if the standards are adopted, teachers would have to justify them to parents.
“What this does is it puts the teachers in the unfortunate position of trying to come between the parents and the kids. Rank and file teachers do not want to have to have this fight which you are going to force them to have.”
Taryn Gal was one of a few people who spoke in favor of the proposed updates. Gal is executive director of the Michigan Organization on Adolescent Sexual Health.
Misinformation about the standards, Gal said, “is doing harm not only to our trust in public education, but to the health and safety of Michigan students. We should not be fearing the adoption of these standards. We should all be fearing what will happen if they are not adopted.
“Michigan’s current health education standards have not been updated since 2007. This means that an entire generation of students has gone through school using outdated guidance that does not reflect what we now know about mental health, technology, vaping, healthy relationships, consent, among many other topics.”
State board member Nikki Snyder, a Republican from Goodrich, proposed the board approve a resolution that declared the proposed standards violate the U.S. Constitution and the precedent set in the Mahmoud v. Taylor case and should be stopped. The resolution failed on a 5-2 vote along party lines, with five Democrats rejecting it.
Tom McMillin of Oakland Township, the other Republican member of the board, supported the resolution and said “we should stop here and reevaluate.”
McMillin warned that if the board approves the standards, “Immense amounts of money will be spent on litigation.”
Lori Higgins is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Detroit. You can reach her at lhiggins@chalkbeat.org.
Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.
