School districts are still trying to figure out how to follow a new state law regulating students' pronouns. House Enrolled Act 1608 requires schools to notify parents if their child asks to be called by a different name, pronoun, title or word. That presumably applies even to nicknames.
The Lake Central School Corporation had implemented a system where the district would require students to put their request in writing, administrators would then speak to the student, and then they would notify a parent.
But Superintendent Dr. Larry Veracco says that drew a complaint from a parent concerned about the disruption to class time, "by pulling them out of class to ask them, 'Is this, you know, what you really want?' in many cases, also, where the parent already knows that this student's choosing to go by a nickname or another name, and then, we contact the parent, who says, 'Yeah, I already knew that. Why are you calling me?'"
Now, Veracco says Lake Central has given parents the ability to notify the district online, if they already know their child wants to be called by a different name — eliminating the need for the school to notify them.
Veracco told the school board Monday that the Indiana Department of Education has not yet provided guidance on the issue, and school corporations appear to be split in how they handle it. "The piece that's still out there is: if Richard wants to be called Rick, do you notify them or not?" Veracco said.
House Enrolled Act 1608 has drawn criticism at Lake Central, with one parent calling it harmful and unnecessary when it was being discussed in the General Assembly.
