Betsy Mendelsohn is the proud mom of a new Einstein High School graduate. But she says her child’s graduation was marred when their legal name, not their preferred name, appeared on the graduation program.
Addressing Montgomery County Board of Education board members who attended the ceremony Tuesday, “you saw my kid and every trans kid get outed in the commencement program,” Mendelsohn said.
“This publication hurt my child, and this is their last memory of MCPS,” she said. Murmurs of sympathy could be heard from the audience.
“My child, who has been known only by their chosen name for five years, officially, in all public school documents, was outed as having a very different name,” Mendelsohn told WTOP.
Under Montgomery County Public Schools guidelines, staff are directed to adopt practices to avoid the inadvertent disclosure of a student’s gender and legal name when they differ from information in the school system’s gender identity intake form.
Mendelsohn said the child had filed Form 560-80 as an eighth grader.
“The school’s error in publishing my student’s birth name for their classmates, families, school staff, and the public to see violates the spirit, certainly, of MCPS policy,” she said at the board meeting.
When Mendelsohn addressed the board Thursday, she said that wasn’t the only time that her child was “outed” at school.
“Teachers typically have called the legal name of each student in that room in order to individually distribute exam tickets or tests, so before each PSAT, SAT, IB, AB, AP, MCAP, whatever, they’re outed,” she said.
“My kid has turned somersaults to try to prevent this from happening,” she told the board.
Her child would try to arrive early to an exam room to collect their test ticket and avoid having their legal name called. Or, “they would delay until all the other students had collected their test tickets, and walk up and say ‘that one’s mine,'” she said in an interview.
Now, Mendelsohn wants to ensure that does not happen to other students.
School board members expressing sympathy and upset included president Grace Rivera-Oven, vice president Brenda Wolff, Laura Stewart and Rita Montoya.
“That is extremely alarming and concerning, and I apologize, Ms. Mendelsohn, I apologize,” Montoya said.
“It is disturbing, especially this being Pride Month. And so, we need to stand by our values, and I think that includes looking at our processes” surrounding the use of preferred names, Stewart told her colleagues.
In her interview with WTOP, Mendelsohn stressed that her child had a good experience with the school system overall.
“They have completely fond memories of Einstein High School. Their lovely friends, many lovely teachers,” Mendelsohn said. But “for them, it’s not a simple experience, getting through school.”
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