Rocklin teachers file unfair labor charge over school district’s gender notification policy

The Rocklin Teachers Professional Association has filed an unfair labor practice charge against the Rocklin Unified School District over the school board’s 4-1 vote earlier this month to implement a parental notification policy that will require district staff to tell parents if their student requests to change their gender identity.

The teachers union has also requested that the state Public Employment Relations Board order Rocklin Unified to rescind the policy.

RTPA said the district is in violation of the Educational Employment Relations Act, as its members were denied the opportunity to bargain over the effects of the policy before the board voted to approve it.

“If the district management is serious about wanting to bargain in good faith, it will follow the same process as required by state law and immediately rescind the policy so we can negotiate,” said RTPA President Travis Mougeotte in a statement Thursday.

Mougeotte and other opponents of the policy say it will force teachers and staff to “out” transgender and gender-nonconforming students and violate student privacy. Parents’ rights advocates say it’s simply an addition to existing parents’ rights agreements, and that teachers and school staff should not be able to withhold important information from parents when their students’ health is concerned.

The board passed the measure Sept. 7 after hours of public comment and protest outside the district office. Michelle Sutherland, a Rocklin parent elected to the board last fall, was the only board member to vote against it.

One of the supporting votes was board president and Loomis elementary school teacher Julie Hupp, whose recorded comments from March 2022 calling for more people of faith to step up and become union site representatives were anonymously released last week.

The unfair practice charge, a copy of which was sent to The Sacramento Bee, shows that the California Teachers Association “demanded” twice to bargain with Rocklin Unified before the Sept. 6 board meeting: first in a cease and desist letter, addressed to Superintendent Roger Stock on Sept. 4; and then in a letter sent by a CTA lawyer to Stock and all board members Sept. 5, outlining various potential legal violations of the then-proposed policy.

“If the Board adopts the (policy) before the District has complied with its obligation to bargain under the Educational Employment Relations Act, the Association will be forced to file an unfair practice charge with the Public Employment Relations Board (PERB),” wrote CTA staff attorney Brian Schmidt on Sept. 5.

“The Association urges the Board to avoid unnecessary litigation by rejecting the proposed revisions or, at a minimum, by postponing any action to adopt them until the District has complied with its duty to bargain.”

The school board never responded to the bargaining demands, the teachers union alleged in the unfair practice document.

Many teachers who spoke at the Sept. 6 meeting, which continued into the early hours of Sept. 7, said they’d refuse to implement the policy and will not violate student privacy.

“RTPA will defend against any attempt to discipline RTPA educators for refusing to follow any directive that violates state law,” Mougeotte said.

Members of the CTA — of which RTPA is an affiliate — have said that Rocklin’s parental notification policy and others like it are a violation of the California Education Code.

“This ‘outing’ policy requires educators to violate state law and the California Education Code. The school board’s decision puts our teachers’ credentials in jeopardy,” Mike Patterson, a CTA board member, said in a statement Thursday.

“A local school board does not have jurisdiction to change state laws. Taxpayer dollars should be invested in teaching and learning instead of being used to defend the RUSD School Board’s misplaced priorities.”

Many parents, teachers and community members raised concerns about the potential legal ramifications at the Sept. 6 meeting.

Those fears aren’t misplaced; California Attorney General Rob Bonta has already sued one school district for voting to implement a similar policy and has threatened legal action against Rocklin Unified as well as Roseville’s Dry Creek Elementary Joint School District, which passed a similar policy last week.

“The Rocklin Unified School District is aware of the concerns raised by the Rocklin Teachers Professional Association,” said Rocklin Unified spokesperson Sundeep Dosanjh.

“The school district is committed to continue to find ways to collaborate with all of our labor partners and to negotiate in good faith.”

The Public Employment Relations Board did not immediately respond to The Bee’s request for comment.