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Colorado parents: Our kids shouldn’t be forced to share bedrooms with opposite sex on school trips

ADF attorneys representing four families file opening brief with 10th Circuit after Jefferson County Public Schools violates parents’ rights

Thursday, Nov 20, 2025

Republished with permission from ADF.  To read the original article follow this link.

DENVER – Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys filed their opening brief Wednesday with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit on behalf of four Colorado families suing their school district over the district’s policy of assigning males who identify as girls to female hotel rooms on overnight school trips. Joe and Serena Wailes, Bret and Susanne Roller, Rob and Jade Perlman, and their children are challenging Jefferson County Public Schools for violating parents’ fundamental right to make decisions about the upbringing and education of their children.

The families are asking the court to stop school-district officials from requiring their children to share bedrooms and shower facilities with students of the opposite sex on school-sponsored overnight trips. The district’s policy of rooming students by gender identity rather than sex without prior notice or a sex-separated alternative violates the families’ free exercise, bodily privacy, and parental rights.

“Parents, not government bureaucrats, have the right and responsibility to direct the upbringing and education of their children, and that includes making informed decisions to protect their children’s privacy,” said ADF Senior Counsel Kate Anderson, director of the ADF Center for Parental Rights.

“This fundamental right is especially vital for all parents who wish to raise their children according to their religious values and protect their children’s bodily privacy. Jefferson County Public Schools claims to ‘freely grant accommodations to all,’ yet they will not offer equal accommodations to religious students to access educational opportunities without sacrificing their bodily privacy.”

The school district’s policy directs that students be “assigned to share overnight accommodations with other students that share the student’s gender identity” rather than rooming by sex. The district tells parents that “girls will be roomed together on one floor, and boys will be roomed together on a different floor.” But officials fail to disclose that they have redefined the words “girl” and “boy” to mean a student’s self-asserted “gender identity” rather than sex. The district refuses to give parents truthful, pertinent information about their children’s overnight accommodations, hampering parents’ ability to make informed decisions about their children’s education and privacy.

ADF attorneys filed the brief in Wailes v. Jefferson County Public Schools after a lower court dismissed the parents’ claims: The Waileses’ 11-year-old daughter was assigned to share a bed with a male student on an overnight school trip. The Rollers discovered, after their young son’s school trip, that the school district had assigned a female to share his cabin and monitor his showers. The Perlmans’ daughter suffered sexual harassment at a district middle school, and therefore they will not risk the district rooming her with a boy. The Brinkmans’ daughter was excluded from overnight activities because the district refused to room her only with girls.

Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization committed to protecting religious freedom, free speech, parental rights, and the sanctity of life.

Wailes v. Jefferson County Public Schools

Description: Jefferson County Public Schools in Colorado is violating parents’ fundamental right to make decisions about the upbringing and education of their children. A school district policy directs that students should be “assigned to share overnight accommodations with other students that share the student’s gender identity” rather than rooming by sex, and the district refuses to give parents truthful, pertinent information about their children’s overnight accommodations, thus hampering parents’ ability to make informed decisions about their children’s education and privacy.