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The day after my article on the San Diego Unified School district policy that requires parents to be notified of student pregnancies and abortions came out last month, the district said its general counsel, Ted Buckley, would review the policy.
Earlier this week, Buckley announced that the district has asked a private law firm to help, in response to a letter sent to the district by Planned Parenthood and the ACLU. In his response, Buckley said:
Given the significance of your concerns, I have decided to request that a review of the policy, the procedure, and the issues raised in your letter be conducted by an independent law firm under contract to the school district.
In their original letter, sent earlier in May, Planned Parenthood and ACLU said:
[San Diego Unified School District] violates the state constitutional right to privacy, and may well endanger students, to the extent it mandates disclosure of a student’s pregnancy and/or plan to have an abortion without her consent. The current SDUSD policy and procedure on mandatory disclosure may subject the district to liability for invasion of privacy and/or endangering students.
Separately, Marge Kleinsmith-Hildebrand, the district’s head of sexual education, told me that the Sex Ed Advisory Committee was working on drafting a new policy that is consistent with state law.