Today, the U.S. Department of Education’s Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO) found that the California Department of Education (CDE) is in continued violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)—a federal law granting parents the right to access their child’s education records—for policies that pressure school officials to conceal information about students’ "gender identity."

“Our investigation found that the California Department of Education egregiously abused its authority by pressuring school officials to withhold information about students’ so-called ‘gender transitions’ from their parents. Under Gavin Newsom’s failed leadership, school personnel have even bragged about facilitating ‘gender transitions,’ and shared strategies to target minors and conceal information about children from their own families. While the Biden Administration turned a blind eye to this deprivation of parental rights and endorsed the irreversible harms done to children in the name of radical transgender ideology, the Trump Administration will fight relentlessly to end it,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “Children do not belong to the State—they belong to families. We will use every available mechanism to hold California accountable for these practices and restore parental rights.” 

SPPO concluded that certain California Department of Education (CDE) policies and practices create powerful state-directed pressure for schools to adopt policies that have led to FERPA noncompliance. Instead of ensuring compliance with FERPA as a recipient of Federal funding, California state laws, guidance, and legal actions – such as AB 1955, which prohibits schools from requiring parents to be informed of their child’s “gender transition” – have effectively coerced districts to withhold information from parents in violation of FERPA. District leaders claim State laws and CDE policies put districts in a position of having to choose between complying with FERPA or getting sued by the State. SPPO further determined that the CDE coerces school districts to withhold information about students’ “gender identity,” including through the use of secret “gender support plans” kept in separate filing systems for the primary purpose of hiding these records from parents. The CDE’s guidance asserts these plans are not part of a student’s cumulative record accessible to parents, which directly violates parents’ rights under FERPA to inspect all education records related to their minor children. 

SPPO has offered CDE the opportunity to voluntarily resolve its FERPA violations by taking the actions including:

• Issuing a notice to all superintendents and administrators informing them that “gender support plans” or other related documentation that is directly related to a student are considered education records under FERPA and are subject to parental inspection upon request;
• Publicizing that there is no “unofficial records” exception to FERPA and further notifying superintendents and administrators that AB 1955, as well as any other California laws, regulations, or policies, should not be interpreted to undermine or contradict federal law, and that violations of FERPA risk loss of federal financial assistance;
• Providing written assurance to SPPO that CDE will allow LEAs to enforce FERPA regarding “gender identity” and pro-parental notification approaches in a manner that aligns with the needs of the districts to ensure compliance;
• The CDE must also have the LEAs certify they understand and are in compliance with FERPA; and
• Adding FERPA training content that is approved by SPPO to the California Education Code (EC) Section 218.3(b)(1)’s LGBTQ cultural competency training for teachers and other certificated employees.

Background

According to SPPO’s investigation and public records, school personnel went to great lengths to conceal children’s “gender transitions,” including by petitioning the student management software company used in many California schools to create features that hide student name changes and pronouns from parents. In emails dating back to 2022, staff discussed changing student names without parental knowledge, using different names in front of parents, and overriding the Parent Portal to limit what parents see. 

Last year, it was reported that at least 300 students in California were put on “Gender Support Plans,” many without parental consent or knowledge. In a case recently heard by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, a mother sued her daughter’s school after finding out that the staff had convinced her daughter to identify as transgender, directed her daughter not to tell her mother, and instructed the daughter on making chest binders. The mother was informed by administrators that they could not inform her of all of this due to their “parental secrecy policy.”

California has also aggressively targeted schools that follow FERPA and refuse to hide students’ “gender identity” from parents. When Chino Valley Unified School District’s school board adopted a parental notification policy in July 2023, state officials—including California State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and California Attorney General Rob Bonta—acted swiftly to stop it, arguing that students have a constitutional right to privacy from their parents in California and that “transgender students may suffer from being ‘outed’ to their parents against their will.” The Attorney General ultimately sued Chino Valley along with other districts who refused to hide information from parents claiming these policies violated the California Constitution and other State laws. 

Since initiating an investigation into CDE in March 2025, SPPO made several requests to CDE to issue guidance to LEAs clarifying that parents have a right to inspect “gender support plans” under FERPA. CDE has repeatedly refused to comply, despite certifying in its grant agreements that it would follow all federal laws.

In March 2025, SPPO sent a Dear Colleague Letter (DCL) to state superintendents reminding them of their compliance obligations under FERPA and designating the practice of hiding a child’s “gender identity” from parents as a “priority concern” for SPPO. Secretary McMahon attached a cover letter to the DCL, stating that “by natural right and moral authority, parents are the primary protectors of their children.”

FERPA is a federal privacy law enforced by the Department’s SPPO. FERPA gives parents the right to access their children’s education records, the right to request record corrections or amendments, and the right to control (with important exceptions) the disclosure of personally identifiable information in education records.