How New Jersey Parents Ended a Secret Gender Transition Policy

At a public meeting on June 15, 2026, the president of the Chathams Board of Education put special emphasis on a single word. “The United States Supreme Court decision Mirabelli is not binding on public school districts in New Jersey,” Ann Ciccarelli said. Four months later, on the evening of October 12, the same board met in the Chatham High School auditorium and voted 7–0 to approve a settlement abandoning its secret gender transition policy for good. Three days later, the parties filed to dismiss Moms for Liberty v. School District of the Chathams Board of Education, a federal lawsuit Thomas More Society brought on behalf of Moms for Liberty and its members, including two Chathams parents.

The New Jersey parents behind the lawsuit

The parents at the center of the case are practicing Christians whose two daughters were enrolled in the early grades of the district’s elementary schools. They believe God created only two genders, male and female, and they have raised their girls in that faith. To protect their privacy and safety, the complaint identified them only as Parents A and B. According to the complaint, their opposition to the district’s policy brought threats and harassment, including repeated doxxing, and the danger was serious enough that a police car had to be posted outside their home.

Tina Descovich, CEO and Co-Founder of Moms for Liberty, who personally verified the complaint, paid eloquent tribute to their courage: “The parents behind this case endured doxxing and harassment simply for asking their school district to respect their role as their children’s primary educators,” said Descovich.

What the Chathams secret gender transition policy allowed

The policy these families were up against began as a template. On January 8, 2024, the board adopted Policy 5145.7, a model policy issued by the New Jersey School Boards Association, and with it came a claim that would not hold up: that New Jersey’s Commissioner of Education directs school districts to accept a student’s asserted gender identity “regardless of parent consent or involvement.” Yet, no such directive existed.

In separate litigation against another New Jersey district, the state Attorney General’s office had already conceded that the policy “is not a policy that every district is mandated to have.” New Jersey’s Appellate Division had also ruled in February 2025 that boards could rescind such policies because they are optional.

Once a student asked to be treated as the opposite sex, the policy put a school counselor in charge of deciding “whether, and to what extent, parents/guardians can be involved.” According to the complaint, the policy also allowed the district to:

Address the student by a chosen name and pronouns, and change school records and reports to the New Jersey Department of Education to match
Keep the student’s “transgender or transitioning status” confidential
Give the student access to restrooms, locker rooms, and changing facilities, and to sports, according to gender identity
Refer the student to outside organizations that “provide support to transgender individuals,” without parental notification or consent

The complaint put the result plainly: a child could “live an entire double life at school hidden from his or her parents.”

Children could be punished for their beliefs

The policy reached beyond the children it claimed to serve. The district’s harassment, intimidation, and bullying policy, 5131.1, treats even “a single incident” motivated by a characteristic such as gender identity as a disciplinary infraction. Read together with Policy 5145.7, the complaint alleged, that meant a student who refused even once to use a classmate’s chosen name or pronouns could be disciplined. The superintendent could also discipline students for conduct away from school grounds, and the complaint warned that this included speech on social media. The district’s code of conduct lists punishments that run from loss of privileges and detention to suspension and expulsion.

The parents had taught their daughters not to say that a classmate had changed sex. Under the policy, the complaint alleged, that obedience to their parents’ faith could have put the girls’ academic futures at risk.

Legal notice, a defiant reply, and a federal lawsuit

In March 2026, Thomas More Society won Mirabelli v. Bonta at the U.S. Supreme Court. In a 6–3 decision, the Court held that school policies concealing a child’s gender transition from parents violate their constitutional rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.

On May 26, 2026, Thomas More Society sent the Chathams district a demand letter. It asked the district to rescind Policy 5145.7 or suspend it until a policy compliant with Mirabelli could be adopted. It also asked the district to confirm in writing that parents would receive advance notice and a chance to opt out, and that school records would not be altered to reflect a child’s asserted transition or kept in a way that conceals it from parents.

No reply came. The board president’s June 15 statement went further than rejecting Mirabelli. “What is binding on the school district of the Chathams is the New Jersey Law against Discrimination,” Ciccarelli told the meeting.

After receiving the letter, the board began the process of dropping the policy, but it made no binding commitment. With the school year set to begin August 31, Thomas More Society filed suit on behalf of Moms for Liberty in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. The lawsuit argued that the district was defying the Supreme Court.

Senior Counsel Christopher Ferrara led the case alongside Senior Counsel B. Tyler Brooks and Staff Counsel Nathan Loyd. Ferrara captured what the families had been forced to endure: “No school has the authority to transition a child behind his or her parents’ backs, and the Supreme Court made that unmistakably clear in Mirabelli. This board told New Jersey parents the ruling didn’t apply to them, kept its secret transition policy on the books, and forced families to go to federal court to protect their own children,” said Ferrara.

On September 14, the board repealed and replaced its entire policy manual and did not readopt Policy 5145.7.

Why a written promise matters

Quietly dropping a policy is not the same as promising it will never return. Ferrara explained the legal principle at stake: “Under Supreme Court precedent in the Fikre case and related decisions, merely dropping a challenged policy due to litigation is not enough,” said Ferrara. “It must be absolutely clear that the policy will not return once the suit is over. And now it is clear.”

The board approved the settlement agreement at its October 12 meeting, with all seven members present voting in favor. Under its terms, the Chathams board:

Will not readopt Policy 5145.7, or any derivative policy including Policy 5756, unless state or federal law requires it on terms that are “compliant with United States Supreme Court precedent.”
Will comply with Supreme Court precedent on the First and Fourteenth Amendment rights of parents, including Mirabelli v. Bonta, Mahmoud v. Taylor, and Wisconsin v. Yoder.
Will give a copy of the settlement agreement to every current and future district employee.

Thomas More Society attorneys then moved to dismiss the case with prejudice, and the stipulation of dismissal was filed on October 15.

Parents as the primary educators of their children

Beneath the case numbers, court filings, and vague policies, the case turned on a principle much older than any school board. Mothers and fathers, not the state, bear the first responsibility for forming their children. The complaint called the role of parents in their children’s religious and moral upbringing “a freedom deeply rooted in American history,” and the Supreme Court has defended it for a century. In 1925, ruling for an order of Catholic sisters who ran schools in Oregon, the Court declared in Pierce v. Society of Sisters that “the child is not the mere creature of the State.” That truth—based in natural law, tradition, and history—runs through Wisconsin v. Yoder in 1972 and Mahmoud v. Taylor in 2025.

Mirabelli applied that principle to the secret gender transition policies spreading through public schools. The Court held that such policies “substantially interfere with the ‘right of parents to guide the religious development of their children.’” A school that hides a child’s transition from his or her parents does more than keep a secret. It takes over a decision that belongs to the family.

When the lawsuit was filed in August, Descovich put it succinctly: parents “are the primary educators and caregivers of their children, not school boards, not counselors, and not ideologues.” The Chathams settlement now commits the board, in writing, to the Supreme Court precedents that protect that role.

What the settlement means for New Jersey parents

In the Chathams, every current and future district employee will receive a copy of the board’s commitment in writing. But beyond one New Jersey school district, this wins stands as a warning to other districts, nationwide, that try to keep parents in the dark. Ferrara offered a pointed word for districts elsewhere that still keep these policies:

“Now that policy is gone for good, every teacher and counselor in the district will receive a copy of the board’s written commitment to respect parents’ rights. Districts that choose to still hide children’s gender transitions from their parents can follow the Chathams’ lead and change course now, or they can explain themselves to a federal judge,” added Ferrara.

With this news, Descovich lauded the parents behind the fight: “Their perseverance has secured a promise that protects every family in the Chathams, and we hope school boards across the country take note.”

“Moms for Liberty will keep standing with parents in every district that tries to come between them and their children,” she added.

The Chathams settlement is part of Thomas More Society’s wider effort to enforce Mirabelli in New Jersey and elsewhere. Read the settlement announcement for the full release.