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Explore the transformative impact of LGBTQ+ education in schools, from student-led GSAs to openly out teachers paving the way for inclusivity.
Explore the transformative impact of LGBTQ+ education in schools, from student-led GSAs to openly out teachers paving the way for inclusivity.
When was the first time you learned about LGBTQ+ people in an educational setting? Not from friends or family, but in an educational space like a classroom or school. What did you learn? Do you remember what the messages were, and how you felt learning about LGBTQ+ people? Was it a positive experience?
Artists and community organizers have the opportunity to express their messages through education. Bringing people together for a support group, holding a protest, or creating a social media graphic about trans history: all these forms of activism bring greater understanding and education to the people they reach. Educators in particular can dedicate their advocacy efforts to finding creative and effective ways to open people’s hearts and minds by sharing their experiences and working toward a better educational system. They might pair their education work with advocacy and organizing work as well because there are so many policies that impact education and the key issues that these educators focus on.
Many lead workshops and presentations for teachers, administrators, student leaders, companies, and more. For instance, when Sameer Jha was fourteen years old, they founded the Empathy Alliance, which has now reached over one million educators across the country. By speaking directly with teachers, Sameer is able to “educate the educators” and improve schools for LGBTQ youth.
Some advocate for changes to education policy, like improving sexual health education or requiring LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum. Rebekah Bruesehoff, for example, testified before her state legislature in New Jersey to require schools to include the accomplishments and contributions of LGBTQ people, as well as disabled people, across all disciplines in the curriculum. So far, only six states have passed similar bills (California, Colorado, Illinois, Oregon, and Nevada). Rebekah advocates for the needs of young people to be seen in their curriculum, so they can show up as their full selves at school and learn about their own histories and bodies.
Educators find impactful ways to share their ideas with bigger audiences, like creating videos on TikTok about intersex history (Mari Wrobi), writing books about inclusion and self-expression (Trinity Neal and Desmond Napoles), or posting informational guides on Instagram to debunk misinformation (Schuyler Bailar). They’ve all designed meaningful educational tools that influence individuals, schools, towns, and the larger society.
Gender-Sexuality Alliances (GSAs), formerly called Gay-Straight Alliances, are spaces for students to build community with each other, take action on important issues, and educate their schools about LGBTQ inclusion. Simply having a GSA improves overall school climate and reduces derogatory comments about LGBTQ people. These student-led, adult-supported groups are foundational to the shifts we’ve seen in schools over the past fifty years. The earliest documented college-based group started in 1970 at Columbia University, and the first secondary-school-based group began at New York City’s George Washington High School in 1972.
Until 2007, the narrative had long been that the first GSA was founded in 1989 at Concord Academy, an elite, private, majority-white school in Massachusetts. It was the first to be named a Gay-Straight Alliance. However, Dominique Johnson, a researcher for the Joseph Beam Youth Collaborative, discovered the demands of the George Washington High School group, which was led by students of color in the Bronx almost two decades before, and published their story in 2007 in the journal Children, Youth and Environments. They had demanded their rights to form a group, to be included in the sexuality curriculum, and to see all homophobic materials removed from their schools. The group had been proposed by an eighteen-year-old student, Elie Lamadrid, and approved by faculty member Alexander Levie.
On the West Coast, Dr. Virginia Uribe created Project 10 twelve years later at Fairfax High School in Los Angeles, California. Project 10 is a reference to the statistic at the time that about 10 percent of the population is gay. Dr. Uribe was known for supporting and uplifting Black students, which also made her a safe adult for LGBT students to reach out to. Alongside her students, she founded the first program in the country meant to address and prevent the high dropout rates of gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth. Dr. Uribe made history not only by founding the program, but also by later being one of the first educators in her district to come out publicly.
Black and Latine students and educators have long been at the forefront of the movement and deserve to similarly be centered in histories about movements for liberation. Of course there are many stories that have gone untold and there will be much more work in uncovering those histories and better documenting new ones as they emerge.
So what happened in the earliest years of LGBTQ students organizing publicly within their schools? Education, of course! But ultimately, the goal of offering education was to provide safety. Dr. Uribe’s students came to her because they felt unsafe and were experiencing bullying. GSAs offer a brave, supportive space for students to simply be themselves without fear of harassment from their peers in the larger school. This safety net helps build confidence and leads to bigger, more public actions, like creating a list of demands for administrators to improve a school, or speaking out publicly to the media or local legislators.
In 1980, BAGLY launched the very first LGBTQ youth speakers bureau, which brought LGBTQ people into public schools to speak with classes and facilitate assemblies. This historic program paved the way for many educational initiatives to come in later years and emphasized the importance of people hearing directly from LGBTQ people about their experiences in order to build empathy and understanding. It provided opportunities for educators and students to undo the stigma and shame they’d learned about LGBTQ communities by asking questions and listening to stories.
Mari Wrobi, one of the educators featured in this chapter, says: “I share my story about being nonbinary, about being trans, about being queer, and education is really where my passion lies, because I am comfortable with questions that otherwise might be considered inappropriate or uncomfortable.” To help educators understand what questions are invasive, Mari provides this opportunity for learning so mistakes aren’t made in the future. They say, “I love answering those questions because I want to help people understand and I also want to help people redirect their inappropriate, possibly offensive, questions to me, who is sitting in the educator space, rather than the people that are just in this person's life. I would much rather have them come to an actual educator than just a trans person or an intersex person that's existing.”
Given the impact of the Lavender Scare in the 1950s and the societal messages degrading queer teachers, it was and continues to be a powerful statement for a teacher to be openly LGBTQ. Messages about gay and trans people being “predators” or “groomers” has long been a technique to stigmatize queer people and distract from other political issues of the time, namely sexual abuse or violence perpetrated by non-LGBTQ people. One historic example is the investigations of Florida teachers in the 1950s. It is estimated that over one hundred teachers lost their jobs in Florida in 1956 due to anti-gay policies, which makes the anti-LGBTQ education policies vilifying affirming educators and removing inclusive curriculum and books even more chilling and reminiscent of this history.
Only twenty states, as well as Puerto Rico and DC, have state laws that prohibit discrimination in schools on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Being an out teacher can come with risks—and also rewards, as it is incredibly meaningful for LGBTQ+ young people to see themselves reflected in their school’s faculty. Teachers can find community with one another through faculty affinity groups, or national resources can help them find support and know they’re not alone. In 1974, the first association for LGBTQ teachers was created in New York, called the Gay Teachers Association, and many more have emerged since then, like the virtual Queer Teachers Rock! support group from Queer Kids Stuff.
