Iowa universities made to ask applicants to list ‘male’ or ‘female’ instead of choosing from a plethora of genders
The decision comes after President Donald Trump’s executive order proclaiming that ‘there are only two genders - male and female.’
Iowa state legislatures asked the board to ‘adopt the same policy outlined by President Trump - that there are only two genders.’
Iowa’s public colleges and universities will no longer ask students to choose among a variety of “genders” besides just “male” and “female.”
A document shared by the Iowa Board of Regents, which oversees the University of Iowa, Iowa State University, and University of Northern Iowa, references recent “direction from executive orders and other directives in the federal government.” The document states that, as of Feb. 13, the three universities began giving new students only three options when choosing their gender on school applications: “Male,” “Female,” and “Prefer not to answer.”
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The schools had already been considering the move since the beginning of February, the document showed.
On Feb. 10, three days before the shift, the Board received a letter (attached in the document shared by the Board) from State Sen. Lynn Evans and State Rep. Taylor Collins referencing President Donald Trump’s new “official policy of the United States that there are only two genders - male and female.”
The state legislators were specifically referring to the president’s executive order, issued on his first day, titled “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”
The representatives wrote that (before the Feb. 13 change) the University of Iowa listed “at least seven different genders” for applicants to choose from. They thus asked “the Board [to] adopt the same policy outlined by President Trump - that there are only two genders.”
The Board will also hold an upcoming meeting on Thursday, at which members will review new strategic plans from the state’s public colleges and universities that curb each school’s DEI initiatives and programs, according to the Iowa City Press-Citizen.
When asked for comment, a Board spokesperson pointed Campus Reform to the document mentioned above.
Campus Reform has reached out to each named university for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
