Fairness and Dignity Are Not Opposites

At the May 19 school board meeting, the board voted to maintain active participation in the Minnesota State High School League. I appreciate that vote. MSHSL membership matters for our students. It provides access not only to athletics, but also to activities, competitions, music, speech, debate, and many opportunities that help students build confidence, teamwork, and community.

During that discussion, a board member also raised concerns about transgender students participating in school sports and argued that athletic participation should be based on “biological sex” rather than gender identity. That position deserves a serious response.

Fairness in athletics matters. Families deserve to know that schools and the Minnesota State High School League take those questions seriously. Reasonable people may have hard questions about how athletic policies should be applied in specific situations. But a vote to remain in MSHSL should not become an opportunity to single out a small number of students and frame their participation as a threat to everyone else.

The comments were framed around important words: fairness, safety, integrity, dignity, and equal opportunity. Those values matter. But when those words are used to support categorical exclusion of transgender students, we need to look closely at what is actually being said and how it affects real students in our schools.

Because if dignity is truly at the center of the concern, students should not be described as “biological males playing in girls’ sports.” They should be described as who they are: transgender girls participating in girls’ sports. That difference matters.

The first phrase reduces a student to anatomy and turns her into a political symbol. The second recognizes that we are talking about a child in our schools — a student with classmates, friends, teachers, a family, a name, and a life that deserves the same basic respect as anyone else’s.

It is possible to discuss athletic policy seriously. It is possible to ask questions about fairness. It is possible to follow legal developments carefully. But it is not student-centered leadership to wrap exclusionary policy preferences in the language of dignity while using language that strips dignity away.

The legal issues here are also more complicated than a simple appeal to “biological sex” or the “original intent” of Title IX suggests. Title IX, state law, federal guidance, court decisions, and MSHSL policy are all part of a changing legal landscape. A school board member can acknowledge that uncertainty without pretending the answer is simple. And a board member can care about district liability without implying that inclusion itself is obviously unlawful.

That distinction matters because the role of school leaders is not to turn every membership vote into a referendum on a vulnerable group of students. The role is to make sure the district follows the law, supports students, respects educators and administrators, and keeps the focus on the educational experience of all scholars.

If we are going to talk about fairness, then let’s be fair enough to name the full reality: transgender students are not outsiders to our school communities. They are our students. They are our children’s classmates, friends, club members, castmates, bandmates, and teammates.

If we are going to talk about safety, then let’s include the safety of students who are already far too often targeted, isolated, or talked about as problems to be managed.

If we are going to talk about integrity, then let’s have the integrity to admit when a policy position would exclude real students from participation.

And if we are going to talk about dignity, then our language should show it before our intentions have to explain it.

I believe our district can remain committed to MSHSL, committed to legal compliance, committed to fairness in athletics, and committed to the dignity of transgender students at the same time.

Our students deserve leaders who can hold fairness, law, and dignity together.