Garden State Times

Assemblywoman Dawn Fantasia passionately defended the importance of maintaining safe spaces for females and protecting hard-won advances in girls-only sports at a recent Roxbury Board of Education meeting. Fantasia, a respected educator and school administrator, expressed her concerns about the impact of policies on female athletes and the potential risks they face.

According to Fantasia, the state's guidance on transgender students, specifically Policy 5756, has negative consequences for female athletes, stating, "It completely hurts our children. It targets female student athletes and rolls back decades of progress under Title IX." She emphasized the physiological differences between male and female athletes, highlighting that "male athletes, biological males, are superior to their female counterparts," leading to increased risks for female students in sports.

Fantasia also raised concerns about the implications of policies that do not consider physiological differences, mentioning, "[These policies] make things unsafe for our females. Another example of zero common sense is separating students not based on physiology, but self-identification." She further highlighted the potential discomfort and intimidation that female students may experience in certain educational settings.

The Roxbury Board of Education deliberated on abolishing its transgender student policy, ultimately voting 5-4 in favor of abolishing the policy. In response to these discussions, Fantasia is sponsoring a bill, "Fairness in Women’s Sports Act" (A775), which aims to ensure that student athletes participate on teams aligning with their biological sex.

The debate around transgender student policies and their impact on female athletes continues to be a topic of discussion, with individuals like Fantasia advocating for the protection of safe spaces and opportunities for girls in sports and education.