Beth Morris and Lexi Trumble wrote an article for Legal Issues in Collegiate Athletics and Sports Litigation Alert that provides insight for education stakeholders on interpreting and implementing the 2024 Title IX regulations' codified protections for LGBTQ+ individuals and the maintenance of sex-separate facilities, including bathrooms, locker rooms, and shower facilities. 

"Title IX has, for decades, permitted separating certain facilities by sex," Beth and Lexi wrote. "However, the 2024 regulations clarify this administration’s position that when such separation causes 'more than de minimis harm,' such as when it denies transgender individuals access to a facility or activity consistent with their gender identity, such separation violates impacted individuals' civil rights."

Beth and Lexi outlined the several exceptions under the Title IX statute and what the "more than de minimis harm" standard means for schools. 

"This new standard — 'more than de minimis harm' — has been criticized as ambiguous, but its definition is well-settled in case law," Beth and Lexi wrote. "In the rule’s preamble, the DOE clarifies that for such harm to be actionable under Title IX, it must be a 'legally cognizable injury,' or 'something more than innocuous.'"

Beth and Lexi also provided takeaways for schools when it comes to compliance with the 2024 Title IX regulations.

You can read the full Sports Litigation Alert article here: On the Basis of Sex: LGBTQ+ Protections Under Title IX and Navigation of Sex-Separate Facilities. Subscribers can read the full Legal Issues in Collegiate Athletics article here.

Legal Issues in Collegiate Athletics is a newsletter dedicated to monitoring case law and legal developments at the intersection of sports and the higher education industry. Sports Litigation Alert is the nation’s only subscription-based periodical reporting on the intersection of sports and the law.