School survey asking about gender identity concerns parents

A survey for sixth grade students in Missouri that asked about drug use and gender identity upset some parents who thought it was inappropriate.

“A lot of that was completely ridiculous for an 11-year-old to answer,” Courtney West, a parent in the Crawford R1 School District in southeast Missouri told KMOV.com.

Samantha Overkramer said the most inappropriate question was whether students ever thought about changing genders.

“My daughter, I mean she just doesn’t understand that,” Overkramer said.

The questions appeared on an anonymous Safe and Drug Free Schools and Community survey administered by the Missouri Department of Mental Health. It asks about bullying behavior as well as drug use and how difficult various substances like alcohol and marijuana are to obtain.

The 2016 survey did not ask about gender identity.

A middle school principal in the Crawford district said students were not obligated to answer questions that made them uncomfortable and the Department of Mental Health confirmed that. But some parents said their children were told they had to answer all the questions.