Alberta to require parent consent or notification before students can use new pronouns, names at school
CBC
Premier Danielle Smith says Alberta parents will need to give permission before a student aged 15 and under can use a name or pronoun at school other than what they were given at birth.
Smith, in a video posted to social media Wednesday afternoon, added that students who are 16 or 17 won't require permission but schools will need to let their parents know first.
Other policies announced by the premier include banning all children under 17 from having top and bottom surgery, though bottom surgery is already limited to adults and banning children aged 15 and under from taking puberty blockers and hormone therapy, unless such therapy has already started.
Teens aged 16 and 17 can start hormone therapy as long as they have permission from their parents, a physician and a psychologist.
Albertans who require transgender surgeries have the procedures performed in Quebec. Smith said efforts will begin to attract these specialists to Alberta so the surgeries can take place in the province.
Smith said teachers need to get any third-party instruction material on gender identity, sexual orientation and human sexuality approved by the Education ministry before they are used in the classroom.
Parents will have to opt students in to every lesson about sex education, sexual orientation or gender identity.
The law right now requires one notification, and parents can opt out.
The new policy also forbids transgender women from competing in women's sports leagues. Smith said the government will work with leagues to set up co-ed or general-neutral divisions for sports.
Smith said she didn't want to encourage or allow children to alter their biology or growth because she said it would pose a risk.
"Making permanent and irreversible decisions regarding one's biological sex while still a youth can severely limit that child's choices in the future," she said.
"Prematurely encouraging or enabling children to alter their very biology or natural growth, no matter how well intentioned and sincere, poses a risk to that child's future that I, as premier, am not comfortable with permitting in our province."
More detail is coming at a press conference on Thursday afternoon.
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