When parents ask a school a direct question about privacy and parental notice, they usually expect a direct answer. A new federal lawsuit out of North Carolina turns on what the district will say, and what it says it cannot say.
The case was filed by Brandon Matthews, a father with a fourth-grade daughter at Mount Pleasant Elementary School and a son entering his senior year at Mount Pleasant High School. Matthews says he asked both principals a narrow question in writing: would he be notified if a member of the opposite biological sex was permitted to use restrooms or locker rooms used by his children?
According to court filings, the principals did respond. They said that because matters involving individual students are confidential, the schools “cannot confirm, disclose, or provide advance notice regarding the status, identity, or accommodations of any particular student.” Matthews argues that answer avoids the question he asked, which he says was about policies and practices, not any student’s identity.
Matthews is represented by America First Legal Foundation and co-counsel Philip Thomas. AFL senior counsel Nicholas Barry has said the central problem is that Matthews “does not currently know whether a male is using his fourth grade daughter’s bathroom,” and asked: “And does he have a constitutional right to know that? We say ‘yes.’” Barry added, “Without that information, he’s just in the dark and... He really can’t make any good decisions without that information.”
In the lawsuit, Matthews says he did not ask for any student’s name or identifying details. Instead, he asked for policy clarity and advance notice, so he could decide what to do for his own children.
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How it became public
Matthews’ concerns over bathroom access predate the lawsuit and played out publicly at school board meetings this spring.
At a May 11 school board meeting, Matthews appeared with his daughter and urged officials to keep boys and girls in separate bathrooms. “Nobody’s targeting a child,” Matthews told the board. “All we’re asking is that the bathrooms are accessible to each gender. If they want that, then create a new bathroom.”
Matthews then asked his daughter to address the board. “I’m personally a girl and I wouldn’t want a boy following me in the girls’ bathroom,” she said. “It’s inappropriate.”
Matthews also used heated language during his remarks. He repeatedly warned officials that he could “get aggressive” and, while discussing protecting his daughter, said, “Anytime somebody touches this little girl, I’m gonna hang them from my garage.” Less than three weeks later, Matthews put his concerns in writing to both principals.
What the district would not answer
In May, Matthews asked his daughter’s principal to notify him “in the event that any biological male is permitted to use the female restroom facilities” she uses. He made a similar request concerning his son’s facilities.
Both principals responded June 8, according to court filings. The elementary school principal wrote that “[b]ecause matters involving individual students are confidential,” the school “cannot confirm, disclose, or provide advance notice regarding the status, identity, or accommodations of any particular student.” The principal also said that if Matthews or his daughter became aware of a specific situation affecting her experience, they could contact the school to discuss concerns. The high school principal sent a nearly identical response, according to the filing.
Matthews and his legal team say that reply is nonresponsive to what he asked. In their view, a school can explain what its rules and practices are without identifying any student.
Matthews filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina against the Cabarrus County Board of Education, Superintendent Dr. John Kopicki and the principals of his children’s schools. He is asking the federal court to order the district to disclose the policies and practices governing access to sex-separated bathrooms and locker rooms at the two schools.
Matthews also sought a preliminary injunction that would require disclosure while the case proceeds, including notice when a member of the opposite sex “has been authorized to enter, or is expected to enter” facilities used by his child.
The legal building blocks
There are three overlapping legal ideas readers should keep separate, because they do different work in court:
- Title IX (a federal civil rights law) addresses sex discrimination in federally funded education programs.
- Constitutional parental rights are usually argued under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause and sometimes alongside the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause when religious belief is involved.
- Privacy can point in two directions at once: a student’s confidentiality interests and a family’s interest in bodily privacy in intimate spaces.
Matthews alleges the district violated his rights under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. In a sworn declaration, Matthews, a practicing Christian, says his religious beliefs include that sex is immutable and that his children should not be expected to undress or use restrooms in the presence of members of the opposite sex.
Where Title IX fits in
Title IX’s core promise is simple: if a school receives federal funds, it cannot exclude or disadvantage students “on the basis of sex.” That principle has fueled decades of disputes about athletics, discipline, harassment, and, more recently, policies touching gender identity and sex-separated spaces.
Still, it helps to separate what Title IX often does in litigation from what it does not automatically provide. As general background, many Title IX disputes focus on discriminatory treatment or effects, not on a parent’s request for individualized advance notice. And Title IX is not usually treated as a stand-alone transparency rule compelling schools to answer every policy question on demand.
At the same time, Title IX can matter indirectly in cases about intimate facilities. If a school’s practices around bathrooms, locker rooms, or changing spaces are alleged to treat one sex unequally or create a hostile environment, Title IX is one of the legal tools that can be invoked. The hard part is connecting the facts to a legal duty a court recognizes and enforces in this specific context.
Can a constitutional claim force disclosure?
Matthews argues that without clear information, he cannot make meaningful decisions for his children. That lands in a familiar constitutional neighborhood: parental rights and religious liberty.
Parents do have recognized constitutional interests in directing the upbringing of their children. Courts have long treated that as a real liberty interest under the Fourteenth Amendment. But those cases do not always translate neatly into day-to-day operational decisions inside a public school.
The question is usually not, “Do parents have rights?” The question is, “Does the Constitution require the specific accommodation being requested here?” In this case, that requested accommodation is advance notice and a meaningful opportunity to opt out when a school authorizes opposite-sex access to intimate spaces used by a parent’s child.
Matthews’ legal team relies heavily on Mahmoud v. Taylor, a Supreme Court decision involving parents who sought notice and an opt-out for certain LGBT-related classroom instruction on religious grounds. The argument is that if notice matters for instruction, it should matter even more for bathrooms, locker rooms, and changing areas because those spaces involve bodily privacy.
Whether that argument succeeds depends on how a court reads the reach of Mahmoud in the facilities context, and whether the requested notice regime is treated as a reasonable protection for families or an unworkable demand that collides with other students’ rights. The court has not ruled on Matthews’ claims.
Privacy and confidentiality
One of the most confusing parts of these disputes is that both sides often use the word “privacy,” but they are not always talking about the same thing. The district’s written responses, as described in court filings, emphasize confidentiality about individual students. Matthews, by contrast, says he is seeking policy-level clarity and notice without identifying anyone.
1) Student confidentiality
Schools have legal obligations to protect student records and personally identifiable information. Even when a parent insists they are not asking for a name, a school may worry that confirming a particular accommodation exists at a particular school, grade, or facility could indirectly identify a student, especially in small communities.
2) Bodily privacy
At the same time, courts have recognized that changing areas, locker rooms, and restrooms implicate heightened privacy interests because they involve bodies, clothing, and vulnerability. Matthews’ claim is essentially that his daughter’s and son’s bodily privacy interests, and his parental decision-making, cannot be protected if he is kept in the dark about what the rules are and how they are applied.
The practical tension is real: a notice requirement might increase one family’s ability to plan, while a poorly designed notice system could increase the risk of revealing information about another student. That tension is part of what courts often have to weigh when asked to order disclosure.
What the suit says it is not
One detail worth slowing down for: Matthews’ attorneys stress that he is seeking information and notice, not an order that bans any student from a facility. They wrote: “Plaintiff seeks only notice and information—he does not seek to prevent any student from using any facility.”
That framing matters legally because courts often treat an information request differently than a request to directly exclude someone. But it also raises a practical question: if a parent receives notice and opts out, what does opting out look like in the school day? A separate facility? Supervision adjustments? Schedule changes? Those implementation details often determine whether a judge views relief as manageable or disruptive.
What to watch next
This case is still at an early stage. The immediate action is the request for a preliminary injunction. That kind of motion forces a judge to evaluate, quickly and with an incomplete record, whether the plaintiff is likely to succeed and whether the harm of waiting is serious enough to justify court-ordered changes right away.
The lawsuit does not allege that Matthews knows a biological male has used his daughter’s bathroom. His attorneys argue that he cannot determine whether it has happened or is permitted to happen. Matthews also said in a sworn declaration that he has been unable to locate a written, publicly available policy explaining when students at either of his children’s schools may be expected to share restrooms or changing facilities with members of the opposite sex.
At an April 13 school board meeting, School Board attorney William Isenhour said “the district addresses the [bathroom and locker room] situation at each school on a case-by-case basis with the goal of addressing concerns of all students and their families,” according to court filings.
However the court rules, a bigger constitutional lesson is already visible: Title IX and constitutional privacy concepts are powerful, but they are not all-purpose tools. They tend to work best when plaintiffs can point to a concrete policy, a concrete practice, and a concrete injury. The hardest cases are the ones like this, where the alleged injury is uncertainty itself, and the remedy is compelled disclosure.
Common questions
Can a school refuse to answer by citing confidentiality?
A school can refuse to disclose student-specific information. The dispute here is whether a parent’s request is truly student-specific, or whether it is a request for policy-level clarity that can be provided without identifying anyone.
Does the Constitution guarantee notice?
There is no simple, universal yes. Courts recognize parental rights, but the scope of a notification duty depends on the context and the specific claim. Cases like Mahmoud may influence how courts think about notice, especially when religious exercise is involved.
Is this mainly a Title IX case?
Not exactly. Title IX is part of the background law governing sex discrimination in schools, but the core request here is about compelled disclosure and notice, which is being pressed primarily through constitutional theories.