The Maui Preparatory Academy is facing legal challenges stemming from a new policy that affects transgender students.
Starting this school year, MPA is requiring students to use bathrooms and locker rooms and participate in sports for the biological genders they were assigned at birth.
The ACLU of Hawaiʻi on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against the school, saying the policy discriminates against transgender students. The organization did so on behalf of the family of an unidentified 9-year-old transgender student who has lived openly as a girl since she was 5 years old, according to the complaint.
"This policy was crafted in part to try to keep the school from having transgender students, which would include having this particular student un-enroll,” said Emily Hills, senior staff attorney for the ACLU of Hawaiʻi.
According to the complaint, the student wanted to graduate from MPA but left “for her safety.”
MPA, a K-12 private school in West Maui serving about 200 students, reportedly initiated discussions for the policy in the summer of 2024.
The ACLU complaint alleges that Tim Hehemann, the new president of the school’s Board of Trustees, pitched a new guideline that “would not admit transgender students to the school.”
Later in the year, the school removed language on gender identity from the non-discrimination policy on its website.
Despite internal and external backlash over the new policy, MPA decided to implement it.
The complaint alleges that MPA violated a state law that prohibits schools that receive state funding from discriminating based on gender identity. It also accuses the school of engaging in deceptive business practices by advertising a policy of non-discrimination and a commitment to “live aloha” because of the new policy.
“An overarching theme for this lawsuit is that inclusivity is part of aloha. A discriminatory policy is the antithesis of aloha. And businesses and schools and organizations shouldn't be able to tout that they're following these values if that's not how they're going to actually behave,” Hills said.
Also on Tuesday, MPA’s co-founder filed a separate lawsuit against the school after his contract to work at the school was not renewed.
The contract non-renewal for Keenan Reader, the school’s former director of college counseling, came after he expressed concerns about the new policy to Miguel Solis, MPA’s head of school.
The lawsuit alleges that the school, Solis and other defendants violated state laws on protecting whistleblowers, wrongful termination and retaliation.
Hawaiʻi Public Radio has reached out to the school for comment.
