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Supporting LGBT+ Students in School

  1. Ask for and use the correct pronouns for your students, their families, and your colleagues 

  2. Integrate LGBT+ topics and figures into your curriculum (see the lesson plan section for more detail)

  3. Use gender-neutral language. Instead of "boys and girls", try: "friends", "learners", "students". Avoid referring to students' guardians as their "mom and dad". 

  4. Advocate for all-gender bathrooms and locker rooms in your school

  5. Call out problematic language like "that's so gay" when you hear it. It's damaging for LGBT students when they hear it, but it's even more damaging when students know a teacher heard the comment but didn't do anything. If you don't address it, you may as well be endorsing it. 

  6. Showing your support by putting up safe space posters, wearing rainbow pins, etc., Even small indications that you're accepting will make LGBT+ student feel safer in your classroom

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Intersectionality

Intersectionality: "The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage; a theoretical approach based on such a premise." (Oxford Dictionary)
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It is important to keep intersectionality in mind when working with LGBT+ students because we all hold multiple, intersecting identities. For example, if you have a neurodiverse, LGBT+ student, it is not enough to individually support them as a neurodiverse student and as an LGBT+ student. You must holistically support them as a neurodiverse, LGBT+ student. 
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