TIPP CITY, Ohio (WCMH) -- A national legal group is aiming to revive its challenge against an Ohio school district for allowing transgender students to use communal restrooms consistent with their gender identity. The Sixth District Court of Appeals in Cincinnati heard oral arguments on Oct. 29 in the suit filed in 2022 by "American First Legal," alleging Dayton-area Bethel Local School District violated the religious liberty of 18 anonymous parents and students when a 14-year-old trans student was granted access to use the girls' restrooms. The suit was dismissed in 2023 by District Judge Michael Newman, who ruled the organization's claim lacked standing and the district's action did not infringe on the parents' free exercise of religion. Soon after, American First Legal appealed Newman's decision. Kaleidoscope to expand with Findlay services, raises $93K for 30th anniversary Former Ohio Solicitor General Ben Flowers spoke on behalf of the 18 parents and students during the October hearing, arguing the district's remedy to allow all students to use single-occupancy bathrooms if they are uncomfortable using the communal restroom is not practical. "The challenged policy accommodates religious objectors by offering them the same accommodation with the same hardships that previously deemed intolerable as applied to transgender students," Flowers said. "[Religious students] have access to the single-user restrooms. With the limited number of those, the large size of the religious communities means students end up holding their urine, refusing to use the bathroom." School district attorney Taylor Knight echoed Newman's ruling and said Bethel's policy did not violate the rights of religious parents and students. She noted the district never restricted the 18 plaintiffs and argued the policy only allowed the trans student to use the school's bathrooms just as other students could. "[The trans student's] risk is, every time she shows up at school to go to the bathroom and is using the restroom that she gender identifies with, it's going to be a problem for her," said Knight. "But, for the religious students, they only have a problem if [the trans student] is in the bathroom at the same time they are." Stray dogs and cats legally protected from abuse, Ohio Supreme Court rules The trans student joined Bethel Middle School in January 2020 after enduring bullying and harassment for being transgender at her previous school district in Fairborn, according to court documents. Before stepping foot on campus, the student's family said they informed the school's administration that she was trans and opted for single-occupancy restrooms for her safety. Problems began when the student realized only two of the five single-occupancy restrooms on campus were accessible and caused her to be tardy to class. Using these restrooms also singled her out as trans.   "I started noticing that other students would taunt and harass me for using the 'sissy bathroom,'" the student wrote in the filing. "Some of the other students would shout transphobic remarks or slurs, refuse to use my preferred pronouns, or ask inappropriate and invasive questions about my body."  After nearly a year of attending Bethel, the student and her mom asked school administrators if she could begin using the girls' restroom. Court documents state the middle school's principal told the student in December 2021 that she could start using the girl's bathroom after winter break.  Arson, assault among more than 60 anti-LGBTQ+ incidents reported in Ohio However, American First Legal wrote in the complaint that Bethel's Board of Education made this change "in secret to avoid community opposition" and announced the new policy at a meeting in January 2022 without public discussion, deliberation, or voting.  Bethel students against the policy "hold their urine and avoid using the restroom at school if at all possible" out of fear "that they will be exposed to the opposite sex," the document states. The complaint also said forcing Muslim students "to use intimate facilities with members of the opposite biological sex is like forcing them to eat pork." "The board is imposing a substantial burden on the free exercise of that faith by placing the children in intimate facilities with members of the opposite biological sex," the complaint states. "Among other things, this directly contradicts their faith on a fundamental moral question and places their children in a situation of compromised modesty."  Bethel school district and American First Legal now await a decision from the appeals court.