The Dallas Express recently reported that a Grapevine-Colleyville ISD (GCISD) parent, in a letter to Grapevine High School Principal Alex Fingers, accused staff in the district of encouraging her child to transition genders.
In the letter, the parent specifically took issue with training for GCISD staff that focused on transgender youth, gender fluidity, and gender-neutral language.
The training was conducted by an outside firm and occurred in September 2019. The event was recorded and initially uploaded to the official GCISD YouTube channel, where it remained for years but was recently removed. Shortly after our article was published, it was no longer available.
According to the parent, and confirmed by The Dallas Express in its own viewing of the video, during a closing question-and-answer segment, the trainer recommended the controversial GENECIS Clinic as an option for GCISD staff to refer children for assistance in transitioning genders.
The GENECIS Clinic, headed by the controversial Dr. Ximena Lopez and housed within Children’s Medical Center in Dallas, provides so-called “gender-affirming” care to minors and children, including “puberty suppression therapy” or transgender hormone usage and “other medical interventions.”
The clinic was briefly shut down in November 2021 by the hospital, citing “public debate over hormone therapy” and “legal challenges” to the practice, but has since reopened under court order while a lawsuit between Dr. Lopez and the hospital over the clinic’s closure works its way through the legal system.
Since entering the legislature, Rep. Bryan Slaton (R-Royce City) has advocated for an end to surgical and chemical medical interventions for minors.
In an August 24 release, Slaton announced that he recently submitted a “series of information requests” to determine whether Texas taxpayer dollars are being used to teach medical students about these “medical interventions” to minors and children at public medical schools.
Representative Slaton said, “Repeatedly, the people of Texas have been told ‘this kind of thing isn’t going on in Texas.’ And yet, the exact opposite is true. Not only are young children being subjected to barbaric gender-modification practices like surgeries and puberty-blocking drugs on a daily basis, but these practices are being taught to the next generation of doctors in some of our public medical schools.”
Slaton’s inquiries highlight yet another controversy for the GENECIS Clinic, uncovering a connection between the clinic’s practices and the education of young medical students.
He found that UT Southwestern offers an “Adolescent and Young Adult Transgender Care” course, which bills itself as “an in-depth educational experience working with transgender youth and adults.”
According to Slaton, the course includes “offsite experiences” and direct engagement with the GENECIS Clinic and its protocols and materials.
The press release stated, “UT Southwestern also admitted ‘students may have observed mastectomy or breast augmentation procedures related to gender transition.'”
While The Dallas Express could not find an authoritative list of all “medical interventions” offered to minors and children by the GENECIS Clinic, we did confirm that the clinic provides its patients the option of transgender hormone usage.
Calling for action by his fellow legislators, Slaton remarked, “The revelation that some of these practices are being taught in public medical schools is abhorrent. Additional investigation into these medical schools should be done so that the people of Texas can have an even clearer idea of what their tax dollars are supporting.”
The Dallas Express reached out to several organizations that bill themselves as supporting transgender youth to seek comment on the GENECIS Clinic’s work specifically, as well as what medical interventions they believed should be available to children generally. Only the Trans Youth Equality Foundation, whose mission is to provide “education, advocacy, and support for transgender children, youth, and their families,” responded.
Susan Maasch of the organization replied with questions about The Dallas Express and its readers. Citing a desire to stop “bigots” from “attacking” the organization, Maasch declined to answer our questions.
“It’s Texas,” Maasch wrote, “… wouldn’t want to get the violent types to attack us and the kind people trying to help trans youth.”
The GCISD board recently passed sweeping changes in response to some of the issues raised by the parent who sent the letter to Principal Fingers.
In a Facebook post, GCISD Board Trustee Shannon Braun wrote that the adopted changes were aimed at “ending the social, cultural, and political agendas that have plagued our district classrooms and putting policies in place that protect the minds and bodies of the children who attend our schools.”
“Whether it’s issues of race, sexuality, or even the very nature of biological sex, the prevalence of instructional materials, books, and curriculum that are all designed to push the whims and worldviews of some adults onto our children has skyrocketed,” Braun continued.