United Methodist Church polity bars "self-avowed practicing homosexuals" from ordination and prohibits same-sex wedding celebrations in their churches or by their clergy. Recently, the consequences for disobeying church polity have increased in severity and the denomination is expected to split. This paper profiles three churches who…

Peggy McIntosh published "White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack" in 1989. Thirty years later, I revisit McIntosh's seminal work on White privilege to reframe her discussion to one involving heterosexual privilege, most notably as that privilege affects LGBTQ teachers. I rewrite several of McIntosh's first-person statements to…

English literature has faced homosexuality in a progressive manner though it has been through a struggling history. That is why a lot of writers of English literature have expressed and enjoyed themselves in their own ways. This paper addresses a few famous writers whose approaches in this regard have been homosexual in type. After looking at the…

A nationwide study (Kosciw et al. 2016) reveals a troubling truth: More than 80% of students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT) have experienced verbal or physical harassment at school and reported higher absenteeism and lower grades due to this harassment. Even more troubling: Many of these students (about 60%) reported…

LGBTQ students in many parts of the United States often experience hostility on the part of other students, teachers, and administrators. This article reviews current terminology, examines present-day attitudes and recent literature, and offers suggestions to educators who want to create safe spaces for all students in their classrooms.

Many students participate in a wide range of school or community-based extracurricular programs. Although there is strong evidence such programs promote healthy development programs that specifically serve sexual and gender minority students (e.g., lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer/questioning [LGBTQ] students), and that address…

This article encourages postsecondary educators to expand the scope of applications of universal design and universal instructional design by exploring how principles of UD and UID can be applied to other social identities, and specifically to gender identity and sexual orientation. There are many parallels that can be drawn between students who…

This article proposes a reflective process to increase awareness of heteronormativity in student-teacher and student-student interactions. I used 3 theoretical lenses -- queer, feminist, and intersectional -- to identify and analyze how gender, sex, and sexuality norms influenced interactions in an after-school reading club. This research site was…

In this article, the author seeks to assemble moments--scholarly, popular, and aesthetic--in order to explore the possibilities that emerge as moments collect in education's encounters with the needs, struggles, and possibilities of transgender lives and practices. Assembling moments, the author argues, illustrates the value of "moments"…

Many primary, secondary and tertiary educators need support to engage in inclusive pedagogical practices that challenge homophobia, transphobia and heteronormativity. We present a border-crossing pedagogy (BCP) designed to assist English language arts educators in translating knowledge into action to demolish deeply engrained anti-lesbian, gay,…

This article explores how choral directors negotiate personal and professional identity in relation to gender discourse. Many music teachers have tried hypermasculine messages, such as "Real men sing," used as recruitment tools for getting adolescent boys to join choir. Designed to counter the perception that "singing is for…

This essay will describe one activity that the author uses in her human sexuality course to illustrate how patriarchal systems have affected the experiences of females and males across the sexual lifespan. Through this fairly simple and straightforward activity students are able to utilize common experiences and knowledge of real-world issues and…

Part of the Center for Education Equity, Mid-Atlantic Equity Consortium's (CEE's) "Exploring Equity Issues" series, this paper defines and discusses the gender spectrum and the challenges that LGBTQ [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning] youth face. It concludes with strategies that teachers and administrators…

This article describes a film entitled "The Year we Thought about Love" (2014) in which a LGBQT troup of teens who are part of a youth troupe called True Colors present the diversity of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender lives in art. Their mission is to break through personal isolation, challenge the status quo, and build thriving…

Few educators or philosophers of education would argue that schools' sole purpose is to keep children safe. Yet a particular subset of students in the United States--lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning (LGBTQ) students--are often served by their schools as if their mere safety were a sufficient objective in and of itself.…