Dear County and District Superintendents and Charter School Administrators:

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Plus Cultural Competency Training Requirements and Resources

California Education Code (EC) Section 218.3(b)(1) requires the California Department of Education (CDE) to finalize the development of online training curriculum to support lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer plus (LGBTQ+) cultural competency training for teachers and other certificated employees on or before July 1, 2025. In addition, the CDE is required to develop an online training delivery platform to host the training content.

EC Section 218.3(c) states that beginning with the 2025–26 school year and continuing through the 2029–30 school year, a local educational agency (LEA) shall provide and require a minimum of one hour of LGBTQ+ cultural competency training annually over the five-year period to all teachers and other certificated employees serving pupils in grades seven to twelve.

The CDE has contracted with the Los Angeles County Office of Education to develop the Providing Relevant, Inclusive Support that Matters (PRISM) for LGBTQ+ Students program. The PRISM curriculum will contain six courses that address all of the topics listed in EC Section 218.3(b)(3). These courses will be available for free and hosted in a learning management system (LMS) that will be available beginning July 2025. The LMS will have the capability to track participation data per school site.

LEAs must provide the training on paid time during the employees’ regular work hours or designated professional development hours unless otherwise negotiated and mutually agreed upon with the employees’ local bargaining unit. LEAs are not prohibited from providing longer, more frequent, relevant in-service training to meet the online training standards, provided that it is mutually agreed to with the employee’s local bargaining unit and follows the requirements listed in EC Section 218.3.

An LEA is required to maintain records documenting both of the following:

• The date that each employee satisfied the requirements of this section.
• The name of the entity that provided the training.

This data must be made available to the CDE upon request as part of the department’s annual compliance monitoring of state and federal programs.

If an LEA chooses to use an alternative to the free online PRISM training, the alternative training must be substantially similar to and meet the same standards of the PRISM training.

If you have any questions regarding this subject, please contact the Teacher and Leader Policy Office by phone at 916-445-7331 or by email at TLPO@cde.ca.gov.

Sincerely,

Tony Thurmond
State Superintendent of Public Instruction