The Trump administration is threatening to cancel funding for a program that provides sex education to young Minnesotans unless references to so-called “gender ideology” are removed within 60 days.
The Minnesota Department of Health, which administers Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP) grants to local organizations and schools, confirmed it was one of 46 states and territories that received the request. A department spokesperson said no funds had been cut and that officials were determining next steps.
The administration’s targeting of Minnesota’s program comes after the federal government two weeks ago stripped California of PREP funding when the state refused to comply with a similar request.
The program focuses on various populations of young people, including those in foster care or aging out of foster care, those who are unhoused, American Indian youth, teens who live in rural areas and teens from communities of color and/or LGBTQ+ communities.
Minnesota PREP’s goals include reducing teen pregnancy and the spread of sexually transmitted infections in young people aged 15-19, as well as “increas[ing] healthy behaviors,” according to a description of the program on the health department’s website.
“There's a lot of things that go into (PREP programs in Minnesota),” said Jill Farris, director of training and education for the University of Minnesota-based Center for Healthy Youth Development, who trains the educators administering PREP programs. “If (PREP funding) were to go by the wayside, it wouldn't just affect the health department. This is going to affect the different communities where this funding lives.”
Farris said Minnesota received $690,000 from the federal government in fiscal year 2024 for PREP programs. The dollars are distributed to local programs across the state that target various populations of young people, who receive relevant and specific education based on the realities of what they face, she said.
For example, Evergreen Youth and Family Services in Bemidji administers a culturally specific program led by Native facilitators for Native youths, along with a program centering youth development in a corrections facility. Other PREP funding grantees across the state focus on different populations of young people, from those in foster care and those with disabilities to those using drugs or alcohol.
These programs and their curricula are evidence-based, Farris said — not just in terms of the information they share, but in terms of promoting healthier behavior in young people. As a result, cutting gender from PREP projects would “compromise the outcomes,” she said.
Young people learn how to navigate not just their own understanding of their gender and what it means for their identity, but how to respect and understand the different genders of those in their communities, Farris said.
“We want folks to be able to get the kind of information that empowers them and makes them feel like they're whole and doing a great job of being human beings,” she said. Taking out mentions of gender would “not only do young people a disservice by not giving them information, (but) we (also) mess with the formula of why a curriculum like this gets the results we want to see,” Farris said, adding that if this funding is removed, there is “nothing to step in and do this work.”
This is not the first time the administration has threatened efforts across the country to support young people based on Trump’s views on gender and what young people are taught. In April, Attorney General Keith Ellison filed a lawsuit in federal court against executive orders that targeted trans and gender non-conforming youth by saying federal funds could not be used to promote “gender ideology” and that the federal government opposes trans women and girls (referred to in the document as men) participating in sports alongside (cisgender) women and girls.
While it remains to be seen whether PREP funding will be pulled from Minnesota, one thing is certain, Farris said: Teenagers here and everywhere else will continue to have questions — about their bodies, about sex, and about their gender identities.
“What happens when students from diverse cultural and gender backgrounds don't have access to culturally appropriate and responsive materials in schools?” asked Kat Rohn, executive director of OutFront Minnesota, an organization that advocates for and provides resources to LGBTQ+ community members. “They get bad information, and they tend to get information about their bodies and their lives from sources that are less reliable and don't allow for good conversation around important topics.”
Farris agreed: “Young people still need this information,” she said. “Those questions about gender don't go away just because there's a disagreement or an ideological difference in how we see (gender).”
This article first appeared on MinnPost and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
