USCA11 Case: 18-13592 Document: 304-1 Date Filed: 12/30/2022 Page: 100 of 150
not the reality. The reality is this child … just want[s] to be accepted.
Id. at 119–20.
Dr. Thomas Aberli, a high school principal with another school district, the Jefferson County Public Schools (“JCPS”) in Kentucky, testified about his school’s bathroom policy as it related to transgender students. Aberli testified that, initially, he was unsure whether being transgender was “a real thing.” Doc. 160-1 at 29. But after diligent research, conversations with community members, and discussions with his staff, Aberli concluded that “being transgender was a real thing that the school would have to respond to.” Id. at 31. While he was principal, Aberli’s school adopted a policy permitting transgender students to use bathrooms aligning with their gender identity. Aberli testified that since adopting the policy, his school has experienced no privacy or security issues related to transgender students using restrooms that matched their gender identity. Although not spelled out in detail, it is clear from the record that several school districts in Florida and across the country maintain alternative bathroom policies similar to BCPS’s and the one at Aberli’s high school.
Notwithstanding its knowledge of the success in other school districts of bathroom policies that permitted transgender students to use school bathrooms consistent with their gender
