Cross dressing and school

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Cross dressing and school

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A lot of parents come to me with the question, "My four year old loves wearing his princess dress, and he now wants to wear it to school. What do I tell the teachers?" Now, what I would say is that there are some teachers that are just wonderful about this, and they welcome the boys in the princess dresses, and it all works out just fine. But, some teachers have a harder time with it, and, in fact, they pull the parent aside and say, "You know, I think we really need to talk about this. Your child is showing some signs of a gender identity disorder, and I would not allow him to wear that princess dress to school." My answer to that is that teacher needs help. The teacher needs help learning about gender acceptance, that it is very important for children to feel proud about who they are and express themselves in any way they want to about their gender, and that means that that boy needs a red carpet to walk into school in his princess dress. And, if the teachers are having trouble, there are organizations like Gender Spectrum who will come to the school and help the teachers develop new understandings of gender diversity, gender acceptance, and gender affirmation.

Watch Video: Cross dressing and school by Diane Ehrensaft, PhD, ...

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Diane Ehrensaft, PhD

Clinical Psychologist

Diane Ehrensaft, PhD is a developmental and clinical psychologist in Oakland, California. She is a parenting expert and also specializes in gender studies and psychotherapy and consultation with gender nonconforming children and their families. She is the author of Gender Born, Gender Made:  Raising Healthy Gender-Nonconforming Children; Mommies Daddies, Donors, Surrogates, Building a Home Within (co-edited with Toni Heineman), Spoiling Childhood, and Parenting Together. Dr. Ehrensaft has made many media appearances, most recently the Anderson Cooper Day show, and has presented and published both nationally and internationally on the subjects of parenting, child development, assisted reproductive technology, and children’s gender development and gender nonconformity.

Dr. Ehrensaft is the Director of Mental Health of the Child and Adolescent Gender Center, a University of California San Francisco-community partnership offering interdisciplinary services to gender conforming children and youth and their families, as well as the psychologist at the UCSF Gender Clinic.

She serves on the faculty of The University of California and is a founding member of A Home Within, a national non-profit organization serving the mental health needs of children and youth in foster care.

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