[Liam]

Originally Posted by always2late

I have a question...and I guess this is the forum to ask...I recently started grad school (yay!). Although classes started earlier this week, our class orientation for my cohort was today. During orientation we were taught how to use a new computer system contracted by the school in order to keep track of our clinical hours. As a Speech-language Pathology grad student, I will be seeing clients in a variety of settings. The new computer program allows us to enter information about the client, such as age, gender, etc... When it came to the prompt for gender, there was a drop down box containing the three acceptable responses. They were "male," "female," and "transgender." So...my question is, do you think this is appropriate? My thoughts on the matter are that if your client states they are male, or female, shouldn't that be how you identify their gender? Is it necessary to identify them as transgender when they identify as a particular gender? What are your thoughts?

Perhaps the school is tracking this population for potential income and/or services that might be available in the future. With the recent overturn with Medicaid regarding medical transitional services, I can see where there might be federal funding available for transgender folks, in the near future. My other thought is that perhaps they are trying to address students who have not transitioned physically and/or they are intersexed or don't necessarily feel comfortable with the usual two choices for gender. In my experience there are more and more transgender folks preferring the gender neutral pronoun, they.