Mother of transgender athlete says Florida investigation has destroyed her daughter’s life

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — A Florida public school employee who faces firing for allowing her transgender daughter to play volleyball at the girls’ high school lashed out at those who outed her child, saying Tuesday that the ensuing investigation has destroyed the girl’s life.

Jessica Norton said her daughter was thriving at Monarch High School in suburban Fort Lauderdale before an anonymous whistleblower informed a Broward County school board member in November that the 16-year-old was playing on the girls’ volleyball team in apparent violation of state law. The Fairness in Women’s Sports Act of 2021 prohibits students born as boys from participating in girls’ sports.

That November tip sparked a school district investigation that led to Norton potentially losing her job as a computer information specialist at Monarch for allowing her daughter to play. Investigators also said that as part of her job, she did not change the child’s gender from “female” to “male” on school records, as district policy requires.

Norton told the school board on Tuesday that her daughter had been elected first and second grade class president, was named student body charity director and was a homecoming princess. That all ended when the investigation began and the girl left Monarch.

“You have destroyed her high school career and her lifelong memories,” Norton said. “I saw the light in my daughter’s eyes as she had plans for the future to organize and attend prom, participate in and lead senior class traditions, give a speech at graduation, and enter college with the confidence and joy that any student like her would have after a successful and empowering high school experience. And 203 days ago, I watched that life snuffed out.”

The girl is now attending school online.

None of the nine board members responded to Norton, who had served the district for seven years and received excellent reviews before November.

The treatment of transgender children has been a sensitive issue across the country in recent years. Florida is one of at least 25 states that have passed bans on gender-affirming care for minors and one of at least 24 states that have passed a law barring transgender women and girls from certain women’s and girls’ sports.

The board was scheduled to vote Tuesday on Superintendent Howard Hepburn’s recommendation to fire Norton, but that decision has been delayed for at least a month. A district committee recommended Norton be suspended for 10 days, but Hepburn overruled the proposal. He did not provide a reason. The board could fire Norton, suspend him or take no action.

Monarch Principal James Cecil and three other administrators were temporarily reassigned at the start of the investigation, but were reinstated after student protests. The state athletic commission fined the school $16,500.

Broward is one of Florida’s most politically liberal counties, with twice as many Democrats as Republicans and a large LGBTQ+ community. The statewide school district is the fifth largest in the country, serving nearly 255,000 students in 327 schools.

According to the county’s investigative report, board member Daniel Foganholi contacted the county police department after receiving the tip. Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis appointed Foganholi last year after the elected board member was found ineligible.

Since 2021, DeSantis has signed the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act and other measures targeting the transgender community. The Nortons are plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit seeking to block the law.

Foganholi did not respond to emails seeking comment last week and Monday.

Norton’s child began taking puberty blockers and estrogen at age 11, but has not undergone gender reassignment surgery, which is rare for minors.

Her parents say she was often benched on Monarch’s volleyball team and, as a boy, has no athletic advantages. When investigators asked Cecil to describe the child, he said, “She looks like a girl to me. … she seems very small, very thin.”

In response to Foganholi’s complaint, Broward schools sent two officials to investigate, and the state Department of Education also hired an investigator.

They took Norton’s daughter’s school records and locked them in a safe. They interviewed officials at Monarch and the daughter’s middle and elementary schools to find out who knew the girl was transgender and when and how her records were changed. They also interviewed Norton and three Monarch volleyball players.

Norton, who has two older children, told them she enrolled her youngest child in kindergarten as a boy in 2013, four years before she started working for the district. In first grade, the child became a girl. She said other parents and children knew, so it was never a complete secret.

She said when her child was in second grade, she asked a school employee to change the child’s gender on her school records. She said then-Superintendent Robert Runcie told her that was the procedure. Runcie left the district in 2021 after an unrelated controversy and has not been contacted.

However, the district says such changes are only allowed if parents first have the child’s birth certificate changed. The birth certificate was not changed until 2021, after Norton began working with the district. The district says after Norton learned of its policy, she should have requested in 2017 to have her child’s gender changed back to male on her records.

Norton told investigators that this was not the case because the altered records were correct – her child was a girl.

Norton knew that new state law barred transgender girls from participating in girls’ sports when her daughter entered high school in 2022. Investigators questioned why she then let her daughter play volleyball and why she checked “female” on a permission form that asked about the child’s “birth sex.”

“Because she’s my child and she wanted to play,” Norton told them. Norton was the coach of the junior volleyball team.

When investigators interviewed the Monarchs volleyball players, they said the team did not change clothes or shower together, so they never undressed with Norton’s daughter. All three said they knew or suspected that Norton’s daughter was transgender, but it did not bother them that she was on the team. The Knights went 13-7 last season.

“I didn’t really have a problem with it because I didn’t think she was a threat to anyone else or anything,” one girl told investigators.