California
has become the first US state to enshrine rights for transgender
schoolchildren.
A new
law requires public schools to allow pupils from kindergarten to the 12th grade
to access male or female toilets according to their preference.
The
legislation also allows transgender schoolchildren to choose whether to play
boys' or girls' sports.
State
Assembly Speaker John Perez said it put "California at the forefront of
leadership on transgender rights".
Massachusetts
and Connecticut have state-wide policies granting the same protections, but
California is the first to put them into law.
Privacy
concerns
Supporters of bill
AB1266, which gives transgender schoolchildren the right to "participate
in sex-segregated programs, activities and facilities", argued that it
would help reduce bullying and discrimination.
School districts in Los Angeles
and San Francisco already had similar polices and had reported no problems,
they noted.
Opponents
of the legislation said allowing pupils of one gender to use facilities
intended for the other could invade the others students' privacy or violate
their rights.
"Will
transgender students make some other children uncomfortable? Perhaps,"
said the bill's author, Democratic Assemblyman Tom Ammiano.
"I
don't want to minimise that, but new experiences are often uncomfortable. That
can't be an excuse for prejudice."
Families
of transgender children have been fighting battles with school districts across
the US over access to toilets and changing rooms.
In
June, a civil rights panel in Colorado ruled that a school had discriminated
against a six-year-old transgender girl by barring her from using the girls'
toilets.
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