Ohio Senate Bill 104 stirs controversy around transgender bathroom policies
Emily Kemper | The Chronicle

On November 27, 2024, Governor Mike DeWine signed Ohio Senate Bill 104 into law. This bill both updated the College Credit Plus program in Ohio and created the Protect All Students Act, which mandates that transgender students use the restroom and locker room that aligns with their sex assigned at birth. The bill also prohibits the creation of gender-neutral facilities, excluding family restrooms or single-occupancy facilities. Senate Bill 104 goes into effect in all Ohio K-12 schools, as well as institutions of higher education, on February 25, 2025.
Senior Olive Weaver, a member of both Hope Squad and the Gender Sexuality Alliance (GSA), said Senate Bill 104 will directly affect her everyday life for the rest of high school and after graduation.
“It’s pretty disheartening because I plan on going off to college and on transitioning, so hearing that I won’t be able to access my preferred bathroom is really scary,” Weaver said. “It’s gonna either require me to jump through a bunch of hoops to access a gender-neutral bathroom, or I’ll have to use the bathroom of my birth gender and feel really uncomfortable, or possibly put myself in an unsafe situation.”
Mason High School (MHS) Principal Ben Brown said that this legislative update likely will not affect Mason’s current policy, as transgender students will still be able to use single-occupancy restrooms. While MHS is legally required to comply with this new law, Brown said that maintaining inclusive excellence in Mason schools and supporting students’ needs is their top priority.
“We’re going to follow the rules, but the most important thing is we would work with those children and their families to figure out what is going to give them the best experience here at school, where they feel safe, protected and welcomed,” Brown said. “That’s our mission every day.”
Brown also said that despite today’s fast-paced, always-changing political environment, MHS will continue to stick to its core beliefs and support students through a vast network of social-emotional support systems.
“Entering into a new cycle from a political realm, I want our students to know that regardless of what’s swirling around in society, we will continue to be consistent with how we support our students,” Brown said. “We are here to educate our kids, but most importantly to provide a nurturing environment to help them achieve their goals as a young person going towards adulthood.”
Senate Bill 104 is just one part of a larger wave of bills aimed at LGBTQ+ students, including House Bill 8, which requires schools to notify a student’s parents if they request to identify in a way that does not align with their sex assigned at birth. Other legislation passed last year also prevents transgender students from participating in sports teams that align with their gender identity and prevents transgender minors from receiving gender-affirming medical care. Weaver said that it is frustrating that laws like these are being passed while issues such as gun violence and mental health are not being addressed.
“Recently, a lot of lawmakers have used trans people or LGBTQ+ identifying people as a reason to push harmful policies that aren’t backed by fact nor evidence,” Weaver said. “As someone who has respect for democracy and our legal systems, it’s disheartening to see that these are the issues that lawmakers choose to continually invest their time, energy and resources in pursuing. It’s just disappointing to see my identity be used as a scapegoat.”
The passing of these bills has the potential to directly and indirectly affect many members of the LGBTQ+ community. Senior MJ Contreras said that they can only imagine how unsafe and uncomfortable their trans peers will feel after this bill goes into effect, and how as a gender-fluid person, they feel it is important to speak up about the unfair ways transgender and gender-non-conforming people are targeted in schools, which they said are supposed to be safe and welcoming places.
“Bathrooms are a public space,” Contreras said. “No one’s ever felt uncomfortable on an airplane; everyone just goes into the same bathroom, does their business, and there’s no problem. I don’t see why it’s a problem at school and you have to go to an assigned bathroom based on something that’s written on a piece of paper. Everybody pees. Everybody does their business, washes their hands, and leaves. Gender shouldn’t be a part of that.”
Supporters of Senate Bill 104 say that the Protect All Students Act will minimize cases of sexual assault in public restrooms. Many use the argument that any person could pose as a transgender woman and gain access to a women’s restroom. However, senior Gina Marra said with or without this bill, predators will always exist, and that this bill will do more harm than good in preventing violence.
“Throughout history, there’s always been a notion or stereotype of LGBTQ people being predators to children, when most of the time that statement is false,” Marra said. “The focus should be on preventing assault, rather than preventing transgender people to access the bathrooms they want to.”
Senior GSA leader Prachi Patel said they believe that a big reason this fear-mongering against trans people persists and harmful legislation continues to get passed is because people are not educating themselves about these issues or understanding the content of proposed bills. They said that it is easy to glimpse a news headline or hear a clip of a speech and then believe the misconceptions it proposes, so it is vital to dig deeper and continue to inform oneself.
“A lot of people don’t actually read these bills, and especially with the election that just happened, people didn’t inform themselves enough and that’s why we are in the state we are now,” Patel said. “[Lawmakers] use a lot of buzzwords and make [bills] sound unnecessarily complicated to discourage people from reading this stuff. But just skim through it, take a look, and do your own research.”
Since Bill 104 has already been passed, there is not much that Ohioans can do to prevent this law from taking effect. However, multiple transgender students, including Hope Squad member Rose Crissman, said that it is important to simply listen to and show support for the students affected by this bill.
“I hope that people can at least start to try to accept, even if they don’t understand,” Crissman said. “Just listening and being there is more than anyone can hope for.”