South Cook News

Cook County Commissioner and former GOP Chair Sean Morrison is calling for immediate investigations and legislative reforms after allegations that Community Unit School District 300 (CUSD 300) allowed three elementary students to socially transition their gender identities at school without informing their parents.

“If true, it’s deeply troubling,” Morrison, who lives in Palos Park, told South Cook News. “Schools are not surrogate parents. Withholding critical information from a child’s legal guardian, especially involving identity or mental health, is not only unethical, it may be unlawful. Parents must be fully informed. Period.” 

Morrison said these secretive policies are not isolated to CUSD 300. 

“Multiple districts, including Chicago Public Schools and suburban systems, have quietly adopted ‘gender support plans’ that explicitly state parents may not be informed if a student socially transitions at school,” he said. “This is not isolated, it’s part of a larger ideological agenda.” 

The allegatons, first reported by the Kane County Reporter, come from a whistleblower who claims the district knowingly kept parents in the dark as elementary school children adopted new names and pronouns. 

District officials, including Superintendent Dr. Martina Smith, have not responded to the allegations.

“It sends the message that bureaucrats know best and parents should stay in their lane,” Morrison said. “That’s not only offensive, it’s dangerous. Public schools are not ideological playgrounds. They exist to educate, not to indoctrinate or conceal.” 

Laurie Parman, a retired veteran teacher and current state representative candidate for House District 66, said that during her time at CUSD 300, teachers were instructed to lie to parents about students’ LGBTQ-related activities.

Parman recalled staff being coached on how to conceal club involvement from parents.

“If a parent called and asked, ‘Where was my student after school on Tuesday?’ and the student was at the LGBTQ club, you were told to say, ‘They were at the Swans Club. It’s a writing club.’ They even said, ‘Because we do writing in there.’ That was the exact wording,” Parman said. 

She added that two staff members raised objections during a meeting introducing the policy.

“As parents, they were offended that the district was teaching staff how to lie to parents,” she said. 

According to Defending Education, Community Unit School District 300 uses a "Student Gender Support Plan" that allows students to control how much of their gender identity is shared, including potentially withholding it from parents. 

The plan, which follows a template from the organization Gender Spectrum, requires staff to use students’ preferred names and pronouns and has raised concerns among some parent groups about transparency and parental rights.

Morrison said the secrecy reflects a broader breakdown between public schools and the families they serve.

“There’s a clear and growing disconnect between public school bureaucracies and the families they serve,” he said. “The solution is twofold: restore transparency mandates and empower parents with more oversight, via curriculum transparency laws, opt-out rights, and stricter notification requirements.” Across the country, similar policies have sparked lawsuits and public backlash. 

States like California, Arizona, Wisconsin and Colorado have seen legal battles over school districts’ decisions to keep gender transitions from parents. 

Advocacy groups, including the Goldwater Institute, argue these policies infringe on constitutional parental rights.Morrison is urging Illinois lawmakers to step in.

“The legislature must act,” he said. “We need statutory protections for parental rights, requiring schools to notify parents of any changes to a child’s gender identity, pronouns, or preferred name. There should be no ambiguity. Parents deserve full visibility.” 

He added that school officials who conceal these decisions should be held accountable.

“If officials are implementing policies in secret, undermining parental authority, or violating transparency requirements, they should face public accountability, and where applicable, legal consequences,” Morrison said.  

Morrison emphasized the serious implications of such secrecy on family trust and ethical standards in taxpayer funded public education.

“These are foundational boundaries,” he said. “A school concealing a gender transition from a parent is engaging in deception, plain and simple. Worse, it may be driving a wedge between children and their families at a time when trust is critical.” 

Morrison also rejected the notion that keeping information from parents is justified by a desire to protect students’ mental health.

“That argument is not only flawed, it’s dangerous,” he said. “Parents are the first line of care, not the enemy. If a school believes a child is unsafe at home, the proper response is to report it to the appropriate authorities, not to conceal vital information and play therapist.” 

He emphasized that the legal and ethical boundaries should be clear.

“That line should be clear: minor children do not have an absolute right to privacy from their parents,” Morrison said. “Parental rights take precedence unless there’s a verified safety risk. Policies must reflect that hierarchy of responsibility.”

He warned that current practices could have lasting harm on children and families.

“Those concerns are valid and backed by medical data,” Morrison said. “Encouraging life-altering identity changes in young children without robust parental involvement is reckless. Schools should not be pushing kids toward decisions that carry long-term psychological and developmental risks.” 

Morrison called for civic engagement from local leadership on this issue.

“Local leaders must stand as a firewall,” he said. “We should be using our platforms to expose these policies, support resolutions affirming parental rights, and pressure lawmakers to act. Silence is complicity.”