Featured Article: Regulating Gender in School Sports (January 10th, 2024)

Public debate over the participation of transgender women in women’s sports has proliferated in recent years, raising questions of fairness in contexts ranging from <a href="https://www.reuters.com/sports/athletics/were-being-hounded-french-transgender-sprinter-decries-olympics-ban-2023-05-09/" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">the Olympics</a> to <a href="https://apnews.com/article/trans-athletes-biden-title-ix-28c6c78e9cd60a4c334de15bfdd624fe#:~:text=Under%20the%20proposal%2C%20it%20would%20be%20much%20more%20difficult%20for%20schools%20to%20ban%2C%20for%20example%2C%20a%20transgender%20girl%20in%20elementary%20school%20from%20playing%20on%20a%20girls%20basketball%20team" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">elementary school sports teams</a>. School districts and athletics associations typically regulate who can participate in their sports leagues, and many have implemented policies that allow students to participate on teams that align with their gender identity at some levels of competition. In the past few years, however, <a href="https://www.lgbtmap.org/equality-maps/youth/sports_participation_bans" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">many states</a> have passed laws preventing transgender women and girls from participating in women’s interscholastic sports. These laws, which often state their purpose as protecting women’s sports, function by limiting participation on sports teams “based on the biological sex at birth of team members.” Proponents of this legislation argue that male physiology confers inherent physical benefits and that <a href="https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/briefs/2019/08/19/18-107bsunitedstates.pdf" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">“biological females”</a> have a competitive disadvantage if “biological males” <a href="https://medium.com/@congresscom/featured-article-regulating-gender-in-school-sports-january-10th-2024-d37029056efc">Read More</a>