RED LION, Pa. — "We're just trying to be like everybody else. We're just trying to be in that normal," Parker Smith, a 2023 Red Lion Area Senior High School graduate and transgender student, said.
Normal for Smith turned into ten-minute walks to the bathroom and back for the last several months of his senior year. The Red Lion Area School District issued an emergency directive in December around transgender students, pertaining to restrooms, locker rooms and sports teams.
"I was pulled out of class in the morning," Smith recalled. "One of the assistant principals pulled me to his office, said, 'This is what it is, this is what's going down and this is what we can do for you.'"
"When I get that call, I was shocked," Parker's mom, Stephanie Smith, said.
Stephanie said when she enrolled Parker in school earlier in the year and didn't believe her son's transgender status would become a problem.
"When I called to register and I said my child prefers to go by the name of Parker and uses male pronouns, immediately 'Oh we have a form for that. Let me email that over to you.' Filled that out, sent it on, from then on he was Parker," Stephanie said.
"The school staff have been incredible. The school board is another story," Stephanie said.
Parker never intended to be someone who spoke out on transgender issues. However, the first proposal he read from the Red Lion Area School District required students either be of age or have parental permission, to be addressed by their preferred name and pronouns. That, he and most officials say, requires students to out themselves both at public and at home, which can be problematic.
"The big one for me was requiring students to out themselves. Where you needed to provide a doctor or therapist note saying you have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria and you need to have a parent sign off and consent to a change of name and pronouns, and teachers have a right to refuse to use those name and pronouns," Smith said. "That makes it entirely unsafe for some kids. Because their parents are extremely against it, and if they even have an inkling, things can go severely south."
"They live in fear they'll be kicked out of their homes or face bullying from their own parents if they were to be discovered," Preston Hildebridle, the executive director of the Pa. Youth Congress, said.
The Red Lion Area School District is not alone in its policy discussions around transgender students in Pennsylvania. Officials with the Pennsylvania Youth Congress, an organization dedicated to advancing LGBTQ+ youth issues, say they've gone from aiding with two-to-four school district issues a year to a number hard to keep up with.
Many parents and board members at Red Lion and across the Commonwealth argue policies surrounding transgender students serve to regulate sports and comfortability for everyone.
Hildebridle, a Dallastown graduate, says when the issue is boiled down to its roots, that's not the case.
"In many cases, the facts don't matter," Hildebridle said. "You can lay out the situation and give out all of the information until you're blue in the face. A lot of times, they've already made up their minds and this is the line of politics they're sticking with. The consequences to the student, faculty, educators and school district itself is all secondary."
Regardless of policy position, there's no denying school board meetings, in which public comment is regularly encouraged on all issues, have contained divisive rhetoric regarding transgender issues. Most recently, someone who spoke at a Red Lion Area School District board meeting insinuated transgender individuals as "evil."
Parker's mom was at that meeting.
"These people are up there saying, 'Don't give evil an inch.' Did you just call my child evil? Did you just call me evil? You've never had a conversation with us. They say 'Just love them.' Are you saying that I don't love my child? Because that's a hill I'll die on," Stephanie said.
That rhetoric, rather than facts, is the number one issue the Pa. Youth Congress faces.
"These are issues based on misinformation, fear-mongering generated by people who are trying to create political rifts, raise money and get political careers started in school boards," Hildebridle said.
"To most of them, this is a theoretical discussion. These are opinions formed through fearmongering. To them, Parker's not a person," Stephanie Smith said. "They're focusing on 'Oh, a boy is going into the girl's room and is going to get a picture of them.' That's not the case."
"Right now people are wanting to treat trans people as the villain because it isn't for everyone," Micki Dawson said, the vice president of Lancaster Pride and a transgender man himself.
Despite transitioning in college, he says his high school experience should and could have been different.
"A lot of time when you see those high school policies, it brings me back to being a high schooler who was scared to accept myself and come out and be comfortable in who I was. Being in a more affirming school setting would have led me to a much better high school experience," Dawson said.
Regardless of the policy debate, officials on all sides say they're trying to help students. For transgender students, many say true communication begins with understanding the community.
"A lot of it comes from a lack of understanding or willingness to just sit down and talk with a trans person," Dawson said.
"No student should be distracted from their studies because adults are saying outrageous things about them and their friends," Hildebridle added.
"Finding a community is hard in the first place. The community you thought you had feels smaller and everything outside of that just feels bigger," Parker Smith said.
"I wish people would climb out of their little boxes, maybe have a conversation with us. There are kids that have tried to take their lives over this," Stephanie Smith said. "Be considerate of them and think about when you're standing up saying we're evil, we're in the room listening to you."