DENVER — The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights said Thursday that Denver Public Schools discriminated against girls by creating a gender-neutral bathroom at East High School and adopting a districtwide policy that allows students to use facilities that correspond with their gender identity.

The Office of Civil Rights gave the district 10 days to agree to a proposed resolution — which includes converting any all-gender restrooms back to single-sex facilities — or “risk imminent enforcement action.”

The agency announced in January that it was investigating DPS after East High created the bathroom last academic year by converting a girls restroom into a bathroom for all genders.

“The district is creating a hostile environment for its students by endangering their safety, privacy and dignity while denying them access to equal educational activities and opportunities,” Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor said in a statement. “Denver is free to endorse a self-defeating gender ideology, but it is not free to accept federal taxpayer funds and harm its students in violation of Title IX.”

DPS spokesman Scott Pribble said the district just received the findings from the Office for Civil Rights and “is determining our next steps.” District officials have previously defended the all-gender restroom at East High, saying its creation was student-led and an inclusive space.

The Trump administration has repeatedly threatened to cut K-12 funding from school districts with policies that the federal government calls discriminatory, especially those that relate to gender identity, the LGBTQ community and race.

DPS, the state’s largest school district, received as much as $96 million in federal grant funding for the 2024-25 academic year.

The district’s Board of Education voted in 2020 to require every school in the district to provide at least one all-gender bathroom in their buildings.

The Office for Civil Rights said in a news release Thursday that both the East High bathroom and the district’s policy allowing students to use a facility based on their gender identity rather than biological sex violated Title IX by discriminating against students’ sex.

Under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, organizations that receive federal funds may provide separate toilet and locker rooms based on sex, but the facilities must be comparable to those offered to students of the opposite sex.

East High created the gender-neutral bathroom after students asked administrators for another facility. The school converted a girls bathroom into an all-gender facility — a decision district officials said was made because it was more cost effective and didn’t require the need to remove urinals form the boys bathroom.

The all-gender bathroom has stalls that offer more privacy than other facilities, with 12-foot walls that almost reach the ceiling and metal blocks that prevent people from seeing through.

East High recently transformed a boys bathroom into a second all-gender restroom, a move the district made in response to the federal government’s investigation and to address any disparity.

But the Office for Civil Rights said the new bathroom “does not remedy its violation of Title IX because males are still allowed to invade sensitive female-only facilities.

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