U.S. DOJ reviews 3 Monterey County school districts over gender identity, parental rights policies

A new federal review of four California school districts is testing whether parents finally get told the truth about gender ideology lessons and locker room policies in their children’s schools.

Story Snapshot

The U.S. Department of Justice is reviewing four California districts over gender ideology and sex education practices.^[1]^[3]^[5]
Investigators are focused on whether parents were clearly told they can opt their children out of these lessons.^[1]^[3]
San Francisco schools are accused of telling teachers they do not need to notify parents about gender ideology topics.^[1]^[4]
The review will also look at bathroom, locker room, and girls’ sports policies based on gender identity instead of biological sex.^[1]^[3]

Federal Review Targets California Districts Over Gender Ideology

The U.S. Department of Justice has opened a formal compliance review into four California public school districts over how they handle sexual orientation and gender ideology in the classroom.^[1]^[3]^[5] The districts named are San Francisco Unified School District, Graves Elementary School District, Santa Rita Union School District, and Soledad Unified School District.^[1]^[3] Federal civil rights lawyers say they are checking whether these systems are following Title IX, the main federal law that bans sex discrimination in education.^[1]

The review centers on lessons and activities about sexual orientation and gender identity that may be taught under labels like “LGBTQ history” or “social studies.”^[1]^[5] Under California law, sex education must include topics on sexual orientation and gender identity, so some coverage of these issues is required statewide.^[1]^[3] The federal government is not questioning the entire idea of such lessons. Instead, it is asking whether parents were told about their rights, and whether schools respected those rights in practice.^[1]^[3]

Parental Opt-Out Rights and Secrecy Concerns

At the heart of the review is a basic question: were parents clearly notified that they could opt their children out of instruction on sexual orientation and gender ideology.^[1]^[3] The Justice Department says it will examine whether, and how, the districts informed families of this right in grades from pre-kindergarten through twelfth grade.^[1]^[3] Federal officials are tying this to recent Supreme Court rulings that they say reaffirm parents’ primary authority over their children’s upbringing and education.^[2]^[4]

The strongest allegation so far is aimed at San Francisco Unified School District. According to the Justice Department, the district has previously advised teachers that they do not need parental permission or even notification to teach or discuss sexual orientation and gender ideology topics.^[1]^[4] If accurate, that guidance would run straight into the Supreme Court’s warning that schools cannot keep parents in the dark about key issues of sexuality and gender in the classroom.^[2]^[4] The Justice Department says this kind of secrecy is exactly what the review is designed to confront.^[1]^[4]

Bathrooms, Locker Rooms, and Girls’ Sports Under the Microscope

Beyond classroom lessons, the review also targets how these districts handle intimate spaces and sports teams. Federal investigators say they will assess policies that allow students to use bathrooms and locker rooms, and to join girls’ sports teams, based on self-declared gender identity rather than biological sex.^[1]^[3] This echoes other recent federal actions against California tied to Title IX, where the government has argued that girls are losing safety and fair competition when sex-based boundaries are erased.

As SFUSD Superintendent Maria Su prepares to give testimony in Washington DC Wednesday, the DOJ announced it’s performing a compliance review into policies surrounding gender and sexuality at SF public schools along with three other California school districts.… pic.twitter.com/rwHUIDa9Cy

— SFist (@SFist) June 9, 2026

California’s own education officials have long said that Title IX protects transgender students and that state law bars discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation. That stance has pushed many local boards to open girls’ spaces and teams to male students who identify as female. Now federal civil rights lawyers are pressing a different part of Title IX, focused on the rights of girls and their parents. The clash sets up a direct conflict between state guidance and national enforcement priorities.

District Responses and What Comes Next for Parents

So far, only one of the four districts, Soledad Unified, is on record in the supplied coverage responding in detail. A statement from its Board of Education says the district believes it is following Title IX and parental rights rules and that it will fully cooperate with the review.^[4] The other districts have not yet laid out public, document-based rebuttals in the material available, leaving the Justice Department’s press release as the main description of their policies.^[1]^[2]^[4]

The Justice Department stresses that a compliance review is not a finding of guilt and that its Civil Rights Division has not yet reached any conclusions.^[1] But federal press releases tend to shape public opinion long before all the evidence is visible.^[1]^[2] For parents in these districts, the review is a chance to demand copies of actual curriculum, opt-out forms, and policy documents. It is also a reminder that, even in deep-blue California, Washington is now watching how schools handle gender ideology, parental notice, and the basic distinction between boys and girls in sports and private spaces.^[1]^[3]