Queer Middle School Students Face Extreme Harassment

(Oct. 1) Middle school LGBT students are more likely to face hostile school climates than their high school counterparts, according to a recently released research brief from the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN).

The research brief, based on data from 626 LGBT middle school students who participated in GLSEN’s 2007 National School Climate Survey, found that LGBT middle school lacked the resources and interventions to improve the school climate, suffered academically because of an unsafe school environment and faced extreme harassment and assault because of their sexual orientation or gender expression.

“The finding should be a wake-up call to school officials and policy makers across the country that we can no longer ignore one of the biggest school climate issues facing middle school students, regardless of sexual orientation,” said Eliza Byard, GLSEN Executive Director.

The research brief found that hostile school environments were negatively affecting LGBT middle school student’s attendance and grades.

Half of the students in the survey reported missing at least one day of school in the past month because they felt unsafe. LGBT students who missed days of school because of safety concerns had GPAs about half a grade lower than LGBT students who did not miss school.

These issues persist in middle schools because students do not have the resources or interventions to change the climate of the school.

Only 4% of students in the survey reported that their school had a Gay-Straight Alliance or similar student club compared to 43% of their high school counterparts.

64%, compared to 86% of high school students, of middle school students reported having at least one teacher or other school staff person in school who they felt was supportive of LGBT students.

When asked about school policies addressing harassment, 52% of LGBT middle school students reported having some type of anti-harassment policy, yet only 17% reported that the policy explicitly addressed protections from harassment based on sexual orientation and/or gender identity/expression.

Inaction to address harassment of LGBT middle school students present an increasingly hostile and unsafe school environment.

The brief found that 91% of LGBT middle school students were called names or threatened in school (compared to 86% of high school students). 59% were pushed or shoved because of their sexual orientation and 41% because of their gender expression compared to 43% and 29%, respectively, of their high school counterparts.

39% of LGBT middle school students reported being assaulted in school because of their sexual orientation (compared to 20% of high school students) and 24% because of their gender expression (compared to 13% of high school students).

Instances of physical harassment and assault against LGBT students and students thought to be LGBT are widespread across the nation’s school and have often garnered national attention.

February of last year Lawrence King, a 15-year-old student of E.O. Green Junior High School in Oxnard, California, was shot in the head at point-blank by then 14-year-old classmate Brandon McInerney.

King had been teased and harassed for his effeminacy and being openly gay since the age of ten. The teasing and harassment intensified when he began to dress in women’s clothing and wear make-up. King had reportedly made flirtatious comments to Brandon McInerney.

Earlier this year, 11-year-old fifth grader Jaheem Herrera took his own life April 16th. His mother claimed that bullying, including anti-gay taunts, played a major role in the tragedy.

The Dekalb County Public School System hired retired Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thelma Moore August 14th to investigate the role the school played in Jaheem’s suicide.

On August 26th the school system released her findings that stated the school system was not at fault in Herrara’s death, that he was not bullied and that when students called him “gay” they meant “happy.”

Less than two weeks prior to Jaheem’s suicide, 11-year-old Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover hanged himself after being bullied at school, including being taunted daily for being gay, despite his mother’s pleas for the school to intervene.

Carl did not identify as gay.

His mother Sirdeaner Walker has since testified in House Subcommittees in support of the Safe Schools Improvement Act.

The Act would require schools that receive Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act funding to implement a comprehensive anti-bullying policy that enumerates categories often targeted by bullies, including race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression and others. It also requires states to include bullying and harassment data in their state-wide needs assessments reporting.

The National School Climate Survey is a biennial report examining the experiences of LGBT middle and high school students in U.S. schools. The report documents the anti-LGBT bias and behaviors that make schools unsafe for many of these youth. The full 2007 sample consisted of 6,209 LGBT secondary school students, from all 50 states and the District of Columbia, between the ages of 13 and 21.