Sweet Briar College Policy Bans Trans Students

Mary Pope HutsonA new admissions policy at private women’s liberal arts school could bar transgender women next school year, requiring that an applicant confirm her sex assigned at birth is female, and that she consistently lives and identifies as a woman.

“Sweet Briar College [in Amherst County] believes that single-sex education is not only our tradition, but also a unique cultural and social resource,” said President Mary Pope Hutson. 

Sweet Briar officials said the policy stems from the legally binding will of founder Indiana Fletcher Williams, which requires that the institution “be a place of ‘girls and young women.'” Hutson said the phrase “must be interpreted as it was understood at the time the Will was written.”

While admissions policies at private undergraduate institutions are exempt from compliance with sex discrimination protections under Title IX, many on college’s faculty opposed the policy, recently voting 48 – 4, in a call for the board to rescind it.