Across the country, a troubling trend is emerging. It places ideology above transparency and institutional power above parental rights. At Americans for Fair Treatment, we believe that parents, not union bosses or government bureaucrats, should make the most important decisions in their children’s lives. That’s why we are proud to join Advancing American Freedom in signing an amicus brief in Heaps v. Delaware Valley Regional High School Board of Education.
The case centers on Christian Heaps, a father in Frenchtown, New Jersey, who learned only after the fact that his daughter’s school had been referring to her using a different name and male pronouns without his knowledge or consent. Even more disturbing, the school actively concealed this information from him. It maintained one version of reality in front of her sibling and family and another behind closed doors. Staff were instructed to avoid notifying the family and even excluded certain teachers from communication because of their relationship to the Heaps family. He only discovered what was happening by overhearing another parent refer to his daughter by a male name.
This wasn’t accidental. It was school policy. According to the district’s official guidelines, “parental consent is not required” and there is “no affirmative duty” for staff to inform parents about a child’s asserted gender identity. In other words, unless a parent specifically asks, they will be kept in the dark.
This is not a question of ideology. It is a question of authority. Who gets to make life-altering decisions about a child: parents or government employees? For more than 250 years, American law has consistently recognized the fundamental right of parents to raise and guide their children. The actions taken by the school district in this case are not just unethical. They are unconstitutional.
Teachers unions across the country have often made these situations harder for educators by supporting policies that sideline parents. In some districts, unions have backed rules that instruct teachers to withhold information about a student’s gender identity unless the student consents, even when there’s no evidence of harm at home. They’ve also lobbied against parental notification laws and promoted professional trainings with rigid ideological frameworks, leaving little room for nuance. Teachers who object or seek to involve parents may face pressure to conform or risk being labeled non-compliant. This environment does not help anyone. It isolates educators, strains trust, and undermines the partnership that should exist between schools and families.
This case follows Mahmoud v. McKnight, in which the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that parents do not need to claim a religious exemption to exercise their rights in guiding their children’s education. As Justice Kagan rightly noted during oral arguments, many concerned parents, religious or not, are uneasy with the aggressive ways some schools are pushing gender ideology. They should not have to declare their faith or end up on a government list just to have a say in what their children are taught or how their children are treated.
Unfortunately, Mr. Heaps’s experience is not isolated. Across the country, parents are discovering that their children have been socially transitioned at school without their knowledge. Some find out only after significant emotional or academic harm has already been done. In this case, once Mr. Heaps learned the truth and removed his daughter from the school, her mental health improved. Her counselor even testified that she no longer wished to socially transition. That is not just a legal concern. It is a human one.
The federal courts remain divided on when this kind of harm begins and whether secrecy in these matters is constitutionally permissible. We believe the Supreme Court should take up this issue now. Unless a school can prove that a child is being abused, which is a legal threshold and not an ideological one, it has no business coming between parents and their children.
Americans for Fair Treatment supports this amicus brief because we believe in fairness, transparency, and the constitutional rights of parents. Schools should never keep secrets from parents about something as serious as gender identity. Teachers unions should support educators by encouraging open communication with families, not by backing policies that force teachers to hide information or navigate these sensitive issues alone.
Public trust depends on open dialogue and respect for family authority, not ideological agendas advanced in the shadows. We urge others who share these concerns to stand with us. The stakes for our children and for our rights as parents could not be higher.
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