At the November South Orange-Maplewood School District Board of Education meeting, the Board passed a resolution 9-0 to join an amicus brief in support of Drew Adams, reaffirming support to the legal rights of transgender students.
The case, Adams v. School Board of St. Johns County, Florida, is currently pending in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, and, according to the Board, is a pivotal case for transgender students rights everywhere. Adams, a transgender boy, filed suit against his local school district challenging their policy forbidding transgender students from accessing facilities consistent with their gender identities.
This is not the first time the Board has joined an amicus brief of this nature; in 2019, the Board approved a resolution to join one in support of Gavin Grimm in Gavin Grimm v. Gloucester County School Board.
The decision to join the brief comes as the South Orange Maplewood community joined communities around the country in celebrating Transgender Awareness Week, which culminated in Transgender Day of Remembrance on Nov. 20, which was observed at a flag raising in South Orange Village. Read more about the observance here.
South Orange & Maplewood officials raise the flag in honor of Transgender Day of Remembrance, Nov. 20, 2021
