Queer Teachers: Out of the Past, Into the Future

With all the flack that teachers have been subjected to lately in the mainstream press, it is past time to give a shout-out to those who continue to brave the difficult challenge of educating our future generations. The first selection, "And They Were Wonderful Teachers: Florida's Purge of Gay and Lesbian Teachers," by Karen L. Graves is a blow by blow historical account of a witchunt that began in the fall of 1956 growing out of a climate fueled by McCarthyism and the cold war, an environment that fostered distrust and suspicion. This book is the story of 87 gay and lesbian teachers, the victims of that purge. Their responses to this persecution are as varied and complex as those folks who testified before HUAC, the House Un-American Activities Council. Count this book as one that puts our present day struggle into proper historical context.

Our second book is an anthology edited by Nelson M. Rodriguez and William F. Pinar titled,"Queering Straight Teachers: Discourse and Identity in Education." These eleven essays are a jumping off point for a different kind of discussion, one that involves straight people just as much as queer ones. It relies on something that old school feminists used to call "conciousness raising." In this case, it just means waking up to the realization that heterosexism along with a preconceived and inflexible conception of gender, only serves to limit the opportunities for self-actualization and achievement for everyone.

Education and Homophobia

Education budget cuts combined with tuition increases in California have impacted students from elementary school level through college. On March 4th protests organized by students occurred throughout the state. For lesbian, gay bisexual and transgender young adults, as for members of ethnic minority communities, budget concerns are only a fraction of the story.

James T. Sears' book, "Gay, Lesbian and Transgender Issues in Education: Programs, Policies, and Practices," the voices of LGBT young people recount their personal experiences as do educators and counselors who also have both an intimate understanding of anti-gay bullying and harassment and the high cost of allowing it to run rampant in an educational setting.

Arthur Lipkin's, "Beyond Diversity Day: A Q&A on Gay and Lesbian issues in Schools" is structured in a question and answer format that includes actual quotations, press clippings of actual incidents and statistics. In an accessible yet analytical style. Lipkin documents the homophobia that he finds to be pervasive throughout the American educational system.

This video "Larry's Law: Fostering Safe and Hate Free Schools is about a California Assembly bill was named after 14 year old Larry King of Oxnard California, an openly gay eighth-grader who was murdered in his classroom by a fellow student.