by David K. Seitz
For any family with school-age children, the arrival of a new school year brings a host of questions. Managing everything from logistics to lunches, from classroom environment to curriculum, families have a lot to contend with.
Like all families, LGBT-headed families have to take care of these details of their children’s school lives. But they also encounter a slew of questions and challenges that are unique to their experiences in educational settings. Fortunately, support is available. This month, we talked with three national organizations that help families and children manage their relationships with schools.
For children and youth with LGBT parents, challenges emerge at both the peer-to-peer and the institutional levels, says Meredith Fenton, the national program director for Children of Lesbians and Gays Everywhere (COLAGE), a national organization that works with children, youth, and adults who have LGBT parents. Fenton says her organization’s model, which focuses on children’s experiences, is fundamental in its approach to school-related challenges.
“We focus on how to equip teachers to intervene in bullying, about how to have conversations at the beginning of the year that make it clear that it’s not okay to bully people because of who’s in their family,” Fenton says. “That’s one of the advantages of COLAGE’s community of children, youth, and adults with LGBT parents, that people can share experiences, talk about the things that they’ve found have worked.”
In addition to anti-bullying materials for teachers, COLAGE provides resources for confronting institution-level challenges for parents, students, teachers, and allies on its website, dedicating an issue of its youth-generated “Just for Us” newsletter to experiences in educational communities.
“An the institutional level, we frequently hear about paperwork that doesn’t have the spaces—‘Guardian 1’ and ‘Guardian 2’—for our families,” Fenton says. “We also hear about curriculum that is lacking in family diversity, that doesn’t talk about families like ours.”
To address family diversity in curriculum, member youth, so-called COLAGErs, have developed a number of visibility resources intended for use in secondary schools. Ranging from a poster series to an anthology to a documentary film, the work is all produced by COLAGErs.
“Teachers can incorporate tools like our art show and our film into any class in order to engage issues of family diversity,” Fenton says.
While COLAGE’s youth-centric approach empowers students with LGBT parents, Jennifer Chrisler, executive director of the national LGBT families advocacy group Family Pride, emphasizes responsibility on the part of parents.
“I’ve encouraged parents to communicate their needs as a family, and how being LGBT relates to that,” Chrisler says. “Whether that’s fair or not—I think it’d be nice if we didn’t have to do that—but the reality is we do. Our number one job as parents is to protect our children and make sure they have the resources they need to grow and thrive, and that includes doing this work in the schools for them.”
Much of Family Pride’s school-related work entails training and activating LGBT parents. The organization’s “Back to School” tool organizes common concerns into a concise checklist, enabling parents to conduct a walk-through at their child’s school. On its website, the organization also provides more detailed reports, among them “Opening Doors” on LGBT parents’ personal experiences and “Opening More Doors” on making institutional change.
Family Pride recently unveiled the Rainbow Report Card, an interactive, internet-based tool that provides parents with custom recommendations based on their own account of conditions and policies at their child’s school.
“It’s unique to each person’s school and each person’s experience,” says Chrisler. “You can actually get real-time feedback from people using the report card.
“Responses have been varied [in terms of school environment], and overwhelmingly positive. Many parents say, ‘I printed out the recommendations; I walked through with principals, teachers, and administrators.’ The tool has helped them know what they do not yet know, to investigate what kinds of policies are in place, what kinds of books are available. It’s been very productive for the people who have used it.”
Parents, says Chrisler, often possess more credibility and power to make change than they may know.
“We’ve found that parents tend to be the most effective advocates,” Chrisler says. “With wholesale curriculum changes, there tends to be tougher resistance when the advocacy comes from outside. But if a parent talks with their child’s teacher, generally, teachers want curriculum and a classroom environment that are best for students.”
For students who come from diverse families, what’s best—developmentally, socially, educationally—is a curriculum that engages that diversity.
“Children learn best when their own world is reflected back to them,” Chrisler says. “If they’re learning math, social studies, how to read, they need to be able to talk about their lives. If a classroom is ill-equipped to address issues of family diversity, it’s not the best learning environment for our children.”
The Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) likewise promotes the development of safe, affirming learning environments for all students. Among its campaigns is the annual No Name-Calling Week. Already scheduled for January 21-25, 2008, No Name-Calling Week empowers students to speak out against bullying through creative expression and art.
GLSEN Education Public Ally Justin Rosado says that GLSEN also distributes materials “to create a safe space within the school, whether it’s a teacher’s office, a classroom, or the school in general, so the students know that this is where they can go to be safe.”
Most teachers and administrators want to do what’s best for kids. The resources provided by these organizations give LGBT-headed families and children the tools they need to help educators do what’s right for all children.
© 2007 by David K. Seitz, and published by Rainbow Rumpus. All rights reserved.
