Senate Bill 5180 amends existing K-12 law and adds a new section to chapter 28A.400 RCW to require school districts to adopt or update gender‑inclusive policies and procedures consistent with a model policy developed by the Washington State School Directors' Association (WSSDA) in collaboration with the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI). The bill directs WSSDA and OSPI to specify minimum elements of the model policy (including use of preferred name/pronouns and protections for gender‑expansive or transgender students), requires each district to designate a primary contact with training and reporting duties, requires districts to provide their policies to OSPI, and requires OSPI to develop and annually notify districts about online training for staff. The bill also adds a new statutory prohibition on retaliation or other adverse action by district or educational service district personnel against staff who support students’ rights or who use curriculum or instructional materials on sexual orientation or gender topics, and prohibits requiring disclosure of a student’s sexual orientation, gender expression, or gender identity without the student’s consent. The bill directs OSPI, with several state agencies, to review and align the Healthy Youth Survey with the model gender‑inclusive policy. Legally, the changes are procedural and administrative: they modify and add statutory requirements for district policies, training, reporting, and personnel protections, and impose compliance obligations on schools subject to state‑tribal education compacts (including curriculum, staffing, employee background checks, nondiscrimination compliance, and financial audits). The bill creates a new non‑retaliation protection and amends multiple RCW sections (including RCW 28A.642.080 and RCW 28A.715.020 and adding a new section in chapter 28A.400); it does not create a new criminal offense or change criminal penalties in the provided text. The provided text is incomplete in places: Sec. 4 (amendment to RCW 28A.715.020) is cut off, other indicated amendments (to RCW 28A.300.535, 28A.600.477, 28A.642.090) are not shown, and the bill text in these extracts does not include formal statutory definitions for terms like “gender inclusive schools,” “gender identity,” or “gender expression.” Several compliance deadlines listed in the text are dated 2019–2020 but the extract does not explain how those past deadlines are treated under this 2025 bill, and the effective date for the new provisions is not provided in the excerpts.

If enacted, the bill will require every school district to use a state model to adopt or update gender‑inclusive policies, name a primary contact who must receive specified training, provide those policies to OSPI and stakeholders, and ensure staff protections against retaliation for supporting students’ gender and sexuality rights or using approved curriculum. OSPI and the Washington State School Directors’ Association will develop the model policy and online training, the Healthy Youth Survey will be aligned with that model, and schools subject to state‑tribal compacts will be required to follow nondiscrimination, staffing, record check, and audit requirements and applicable post‑2013 legislation. The parties most affected are school districts (and their boards) and educational service districts, which will bear the administrative work, training coordination, and some ongoing reporting and audit duties, while OSPI and WSSDA take on model and training development. School employees gain explicit protection from retaliation for supporting student rights, and districts will have less ability to require disclosure of a student’s sexual orientation or gender identity. It is unclear how the bill treats the many compliance dates listed that are already in the past and the effective date and some amendment details are missing from the provided text.