Published June 12, 2025
On June 12, Ethics and Public Policy Center fellow Eric Kniffin filed an amicus brief in Jennifer Vitsaxaki v. Skaneateles Central School District. This 2nd Circuit case was originally brought by Jennifer Vitsaxaki of New York, whose middle-school daughter was diagnosed with gender confusion and encouraged to socially transition at school without parental knowledge or consent. The school also lied to Mrs. Vitsaxaki, actively concealing meetings with her daughter and coaching staff to use the girl’s given name and female pronouns when talking to Mrs. Vitsaxaki while using a masculine name and incorrect pronouns at school.
As Kniffin summarized in the brief:
[A] long line of Supreme Court cases makes plain that parents have the constitutional right to direct their children’s upbringing. By any reasonable metric, a school’s decision to treat a female child as though she were a boy falls within this well-established right. …
The school district should know better because New York knows better. … New York law and state-issued guidance … requires school districts to inform parents when they learn that a child needs glasses. State-issued guidance requires school health centers to get parents’ informed consent before treating a child, including for mental health treatments. And New York law specifically requires that schools get parental consent in writing before students can carry insulin or even sunscreen. …
[T]his Court should reverse the decision below and affirm parents’ fundamental rights to raise and protect their children.
Eric Kniffin is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he works on a range of initiatives to protect and strengthen religious liberty as part of EPPC’s Administrative State Accountability Project.
