Gender identity and human rights was the focus of a meeting this week between local school officials and community representatives. An invitation was extended to members of the ad hoc Community Connections Committee as well as parent advisory council members to discuss some of the things happening across the province and upcoming within Border Land School Division.

"We had shared with them that River East Transcona (School Division) had a human rights case in regards to a transitioning student and washroom use," explains Superintendent Krista Curry. She goes on to say that an update was given on the MHSAA (Manitoba High School Athletics Association) transgender policy in place, as well as a document coming out from Manitoba Education and Training about supporting transgender and gender-diverse students in Manitoba schools.

"It's not released yet but we know that it's coming."Curry adds, "We also shared that our Board and Senior Admin had a retreat in November and we did have a presentation from the Crisis and Trauma Resource Institute on gender and sexual identity in youth."

As for what's coming in the future for Border Land, Curry says a group of employees have started to gather and develop a procedure for gender identity guidelines for students and expects one will be developed for staff as well.

"We've met once and we will continue to meet until we have a draft that we are ready to take to the Board (of Trustees)."

Once the draft is complete it will be taken to the Border Land leadership team - a group of principals - to garner some feedback. Curry explains procedures are written to guide the day-to-day operations in schools and so this document will be taken to the team with that goal in mind.

"So as a principal, if you had a scenario that came up, could you look at this procedure and what it guide you in terms of what you should and shouldn't do in your school?"

After this feedback comes in, she says the draft procedure will then be taken to the Board of Trustees to be vetted and then shared with the Community Connections Committee as PAC members.

"Not necessarily for specific input for changes but so that they can have the opportunity to review it and ask questions so that if they have other people that are coming to them with questions, they have some understanding."

Also on the docket for the new year is the installation of gender-neutral bathrooms and other spaces in schools throughout the Division. Curry explains these bathrooms will be a single stall, single use facility - not multi-stalled - and will be available for anyone who feels more comfortable using this type of washroom over the larger, multi-stalled facilities that already exist in most schools.

"We feel that that will be seen as positive in many regards, there's lots of young people who would prefer to have more privacy when using a washroom."

Curry explains the changes will first happen schools where the work can be done without a bunch of renovations.

Overall Curry feels the Tuesday meeting went well, noting there was diversity among the room just like there is in every school and every community.

"People I think have an understanding that there's some laws that we need to follow as a public school division and so even if there's things that are happening that personally people don't agree with, they at least understand that this isn't something that is being done intentionally because we know it's different than what they might believe."

She feels there is an understanding that decisions are made to support all students in the school division, to make sure all students feel included and safe.

"If they have specific questions about decisions that are made that are in-turn making their family feel uncomfortable, they need to come and talk to use about that too because our goal is to make sure that everybody feels like they belong."

There has however been some discontent among parents lately, feeling like the lines of communication between school officials and themselves haven't been as open as they'd like. When asked about this, Curry explained that the school division cannot legally share information about a specific situation.

"We don't share out specific private information, we can't do that, but what we can do is we can share direction that the school division is going (and) we can share procedures that are in place so that when they do hear something they understand why certain decisions have been made."

Up next, Curry says the intention is to hold a meeting with members of the ministerial throughout Border Land, noting the purpose is not about education or challenging people's different perspectives or beliefs but to share the information trustees have as a public school board and the things that it needs to follow - for example the Human Rights Code.

"We know that members of the congregation often go to their local pastors, ministers, deacons - people they trust to ask questions - and so for us it's about providing them with factual information so they can help and support those people when they have questions as to why the Division is doing what it's doing."