Westminster College has terrible timing.
The private school in Utah has just approved biological men who identify as females to play on women’s sports teams and use their locker rooms, according to an email from the Title IX coordinator obtained by Campus Reform.
The only problem? The federal “guidance” document that tells schools to treat students by their gender identity (if it clashes with their sex) was just halted from enforcement by a federal judge in Texas.
MORE: Transgender bathroom rules likely violate Title IX, judge rules
The email cites the “Dear Colleague” letter sent to schools in May and the “newly-affirmed rights” it granted to transgender students. As a result of the new guidance, the school promises that:
All employees will use “names and pronouns consistent with a transgender student’s gender identity”
Students can use whichever restroom or locker room is “consistent with their gender identity,” and students who don’t want biological males or females in their spaces can “voluntarily” use “individual-user” facilities (this is taken directly from the federal guidance language)
They can use whichever housing is consistent with their gender identity
“All students” can play whichever sport is consistent with their gender identity
As Campus Reform notes, Westminster gives itself some wiggle room on sports, saying that when a student is competing for a slot on a team or “the activity involved is a contact sport,”
Westminster College will make tailored requirements based on sound, current, and research-based medical knowledge about the impact of an individual student’s participation on the competitive fairness or physical safety of the sport.
MORE: Supreme Court halts transgender bathroom case
It’s possible that Westminster would have gone along with the gender-identity changes even if the federal judge had ruled against the Department of Education’s guidance earlier.
Since the judge is in Texas, the Department of Education could have felt free to bring legal action against Westminster without being slapped down in court immediately. Utah is governed by the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, while Texas is governed by the 5th.
MORE: Christian college sues the feds over Title IX rape rules
Like The College Fix on Facebook / Follow us on Twitter
IMAGE: Shutterstock
Please join the conversation about our stories on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, MeWe, Rumble, Gab, Minds and Gettr.