San Diego Unified Wants LGBTQ Students To Feel Welcome

I Maureen Cavanaugh. This has been an important year for the LGB GT. High-profile transgender men and women have been in the news. Even as old taboos are fading, we've seen evidence a growing up as a member of the LGBTQ community can take a devastating to all . At least for transgender teenagers have committed that's committed suicide just this year. October is LGBTQ history month which also happens to coincide with bullying prevention month . Joining me with more is for an and more. He is executive director of the office of youth advocacy at San Diego unified. Welcome to the show. Thank you. Fernando López is also joining us by phone. Is a member of the San Diego LGBTQ advisory Council. Fernand, how will teachers include LGBTQ history into the classes? What we have is a dedicated website and resources for teachers to view and look at with regards to LGBTQ history month. They are able to take some resources and incorporate that into their lessons. The bottom line of what we are looking for is for our teachers at all of our levels kindergarten through 12th grade to utilize the resources and incorporate them into lessons not just in this month but all throughout the year. Why then was this month designated as a special LGBTQ history month? This month is a national recognition of LGBTQ history. Similarly the way we do black history month in other months. It's great because it does coincide with the anti-bullying because we want to make sure our schools are safe and secure. Also the month of October includes October 11 which is a national coming out Day. It's a very important day in the LGBTQ community and for schools at the beginning of our school year , we just started in early September. This is a great month to kick off this effort and to ensure that all of our students, including a LGBTQ community, is safe and included in our schools. Fernando, tell us why it's important for kids to hear about the history of the LGBTQ community at school? Historically the LGBTQ community has been fill a nice, dehumanized and discriminated against. All too often with dire consequences. Were actually showing the full diversity spectrum of experience that has gone throughout the US, world California in San Diego history we start to tell the true narrative of the life and experience these of the LGBTQ and other communities that brings in authenticity and helps to build a narrative and helps to show these young people that they can be valued embers and leaders of their community other than just a caricature or stereotype that one might see on television or some of the derogatory things he might hear while walking down a classroom hallway. Fernando, and other studies -- another study started being taught, the stores of so many people that have been left out of history were uncovered. Do you think that is the case with LGBTQ history as well? Of course. There's a definite and real rich history of how many people are aware of Roosevelt or others who built the first computer to help defeat the Nazis in World War II. Even Harvey milks connection to San Diego. Christine key who's from San Diego was a pioneer of the LGBTQ political movement or Billy Bean who was an athlete with the Padres. There's so much history that people are unaware of. A lot of it has local ties which is important when were talking about curriculum development for San Diego unified and having some of that source material. Vernon you made the point that this history month coincides with the bullying prevention month. Is it just a coincidence? It could. Once events on the national level. It's actually productive because as I mentioned before, our effort is to make sure the folks are feeling safe, secure and included into our schools. And so the fact that these months coincide speaks to a larger effort of ensuring that our policies, procedures, our teachers are reminded of those in some legislation that his best in the recent years to make a campuses safer all of our kids. As a school board member, bullying of LGBTQ students is going on and sometimes staff standby and don't stop it. What is being done about that? There is plenty being done about that including ensuring that all of our staff have mandatory training on our bullying procedure. We have a very comprehensive bullying print -- procedure that includes mandating reporting a bullying, documentation of investigations of bullying in a report back to the district level for monitoring. So we are taking a very affirmative stance. We have some challenges. We had for students that came up to our school board last week when we presented this resolution and they were very direct in their commentary on what their experience at school had been. They talked about the lack of we have a duty to keep our school safe and inclusive. Critics have said San Diego unified has been dragging its feet in bringing up LGBTQ history. In your opinion, has a been a holdup? Yes. I think the San Diego unified has been dragging its feet and I understand some of the bureaucracy and respect Doctor more and folks who are at the school board led -- level. The fact is that we have been sitting at committee meetings for five years asking for these changes that happen and it's one thing to pass a policy or resolution and those are all great and send a wonderful message, but what needs to happen is the implementation which is why some of the committee members have dropped off over the frustration and feel like there's -- I feel -- I have a lot of faith in what's going to happen. That sort of bullying when they feel like the only recourse is to take their own lives shows how much work we have yet to do in our school systems and curriculum development and implementation is a very challenging thing. I know that our teachers have a lot on their plate already. It's asking them to do one more thing which is why these committees exist to help them create the curriculum in a way of introducing that into the school system. Until we really invest in put dollars behind these policy promises, we're not going to make row progress. Those steps are starting to be taken in thanks to the work of people like Doctor more we're getting there. It's been a long and frustrating process. What would you say are the biggest hurdles that remain to the full implementation of this inclusion that you're talking about in introducing LGBTQ history and also making sure that students are safe and they feel safe in school. To Fernando is point, one of our biggest hurdles is ensuring that our staff are properly trained. So they know where to find the resources, know what to do when they are dealing with situations with our students and ensuring that they understand the laws that are in effect, fair education act, sets law, the transgender law and making sure that our faculty are administrators and all of our campus employees in district employees understand that we are legally bound but more importantly were morally bound to ensure that our kids are safe and that we respond appropriately. So if a student is dealing with something that is so severe that they are considering suicide, we know how to get resources to that student into the family. I've been speaking with Vernon Moore and Fernando López. Thanks to both of you gentlemen very much.