A bill introduced in the Tennessee legislature seeks to allow teachers not to use a student’s preferred pronoun if it is inconsistent with their biological sex.
“A teacher or other employee of a public school or LEA is not required to refer to a student using the student’s preferred pronoun if the pronoun does not align with the student’s biological sex,” the bill states.
The bill also states that a teacher or employee would be waived of “civil liability and adverse employment action” if they chose to refer to a student using the pronoun aligned with the student’s biological sex rather than their preferred pronoun.
The note referred to a June 2021 letter by the U.S. Department of Education that said that the department views sex discrimination prohibited under Title IX laws to include discrimination based on gender identity.
The committee also referred to a June fact sheet issued by the U.S. Department of Education entitled “Supporting Transgender Youth in School,” which calls on schools to adopt policies “that respect all students’ gender identities, such as the use of the name a student goes by, which may be different from their legal name, and pronouns that reflect a student’s gender identity.”
If passed, the legislation could limit the ability of the state’s Department of Education Office for Civil Rights to “develop corrective action plans that compel schools to require their staff to use students’ preferred pronouns,” the note stated.
The committee concluded that this law could be in violation of Title IX and thus mean federal funding could be pulled as a result. The state received more than $5 billion in federal funding during the 2021-22 fiscal year, according to the note.
The bill has been referred to the state’s Senate Finance, Ways, and Means Committee where it is due to be discussed on April 26.
