Locker Room Access for ALL Students

           Changing in front of peers is a common practice student’s face in physical education class and in sports, at De Anza College.

            In a recent article by Korin Miller, on Yahoo Health, a student in Chicago was denied full access to the girl’s locker room.

Photo by Ant Smith at London Pride

            The student, who identifies as a girl, was denied full access to the girl’s locker room in 2013, The Chicago Tribune reports.

            For some student’s such as Jonathan Mota, a 22-year-old business major, “changing in the locker was nothing.”

While other students like Victor Noguera, a 23-year-old economics major, “Always felt uncomfortable changing in front of everyone because I was super shy.”

Since these students do not identify different from the gender they were born with they do not have to worry about having access to locker rooms.

In recent years the transgender community has made big strides in schools. Gaining access to bathrooms with the gender in which they identify with, and access in sports in which that gender qualifies for.

Locker room access on the other hand has been an ongoing battle for students in the transgender community.

Many transgender students have been denied locker room access with the sex they identify with for privacy reasons.

“I don’t know if I would be OK with changing in front of someone I knew was really a girl, or used to be a girl,” said, Edgar Rey, a 20-year-old business major. 

It’s not that he is trying to discriminate against these students, but more that he would not be comfortable to expose himself around them, Rey said.   

“All students deserve the opportunity to participate equally in school programs and activities – this is a basic civil right,” Catherine Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights at the Department of Education said in a statement to Yahoo Health on Nov. 3rd.

Photo by Ginna Fleming

Though uncomfortable with having to be in a situation with having a transgender student with them in a locker room, five of the five De Anza students interviewed agreed that they would be OK with it.

Marissa Castro, a 22-year-old environmental studies major, said in high school she dealt with a transgender student.

“I didn’t care, she was a girl to us,” she said. “I knew she wasn’t going to creep on me or anything like the boys did.”

California has become widely known as an accepting state, and heavy supporters of its LGBTQ communities.

In 2013 California was one of the first states to pass a law allowing students from Kindergarten through 12^th grade to participate in sports, use bathroom and other facilities based on their self-perception and regardless of their birth gender.

Democratic Assembly Speaker John Perez said the law "puts California at the forefront of leadership on transgender rights." CSN news reported in August 2013.

Colton Delaney, a 20-year-old English major, and gay student at De Anza knows firsthand how accepting California is, yet how frustrating it could also be for his fellow LGBTQ.

Students have always been accepting and comfortable with his sexuality, Delaney said.

“But I know it is still a difficult thing for my friends that are transgender to even think about changing in a girl’s locker room,” Delaney said.