Smith College, one of the largest all-female colleges in the United States, is facing a Title IX investigation from the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights after the college admitted biological male students, granting them access to women-only spaces.
Men admitted to the school were able to access dormitories, bathrooms, locker rooms, and athletic teams, according to the DOE.
“An all-women’s college loses all meaning if it is admitting biological males,” said Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey. “Allowing biological males into spaces designed for women raises serious concerns about privacy, fairness, and compliance under federal law. The Trump Administration will continue to uphold the law and fight to restore common sense.”
With Title IX compliance, there is an exception for single-sex institutions. The exception, however, ceases to apply when an institution enrolls students based on gender identity. Every student enrolled must match the school’s stated biological sex: all biological men at an all-male school, all biological women at an all-female school.
“When an institution holds itself out as being an all-women’s college, it is not just promising to deliver female-only dorms and bathrooms, and single-sex athletics; it is also committing to maintain a student body that makes possible a particular form of sorority and camaraderie,” DOE said in its press release.
In 2023, CNN reported a transgender student named Avery had enrolled at Smith. The school had previously welcomed transgender women — men who identify as women — and nonbinary students, but Avery was attending as a transgender man.
While at the time, Smith’s admissions policy did not allow for transgender men, biological women who identify as men, Smith spokeswoman Carolyn McDaniel told CNN, “Once admitted, every student has the full support of the college, and this includes trans men.”
Wellesley College, another northeastern women’s college, also accepts women based on identity. According to the school’s admissions policy, “Wellesley will consider for admission any applicant who lives as a woman and consistently identifies as a woman.”
“Smith College has a longstanding reputation as a women’s college of exclusive excellence. But that hasn’t prevented it from falling victim to the fiction of ‘transgender’ womanhood,” Sarah Parshall Perry, vice president and senior legal fellow at Defending Education said in a statement. “Smith also discriminates against women by operating bathroom and facilities policies that open spaces once reserved for women’s safety and privacy to anyone who ‘identifies’ as a woman.”
Countless of ostensibly “female-only” colleges and universities across the country accept male students, as long as they identify as female, non-binary, or transgender, among other gender-dysphoric terms.
Men continue to enter female spaces under the guise of gender-identity, including sororities, like Kappa Kappa Gamma, when a transgender-identifying student joined the University of Wyoming chapter in 2022. Further, men are currently able to join Daughters of the American Revolution, as long as they identify as female.
Smith College is a private liberal arts college located in Northampton, Mass., and was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith. The college is a member of the Seven Sister Colleges, a historic group of female-only colleges in the northeast.
Smith College did not immediately respond to National Review‘s request for comment.