BlogPost5: The Rainbow Connection

As a famous alumni from my high school once said, “in Northeast Ohio, nothing is given. Everything is earned. You work for what you have." This quote applies not only to a national basketball championship, but also to the experiences of students who were members of the LGBTQ community that attended St. Vincent-St. Mary High School. These students had to work for the respect that they should have deserved, and yet, many students never were able to fully attain this respect. This became incredibly obvious to me at my graduation ceremony. A good friend of mine who is transgender was prevented from walking across the stage at graduation, solely because he wanted to wear the color cap and gown that properly conveyed the gender he identified with rather than his sex. The fact that he was top of our class, an excellent student, National Merit Scholar, and served on executive boards of multiple extracurricular clubs was completely ignored.

This was not the only instance of homophobia and heterosexism at my high school. There were several other instances where students of the LGBTQ community were not treated with the respect that they deserved. Students would make rude, offensive comments. Teachers and faculty would ignore preferred names if they weren’t your given name. Efforts were made by students to combat this negative environment, but it is difficult to effect change when the faculty is working against you.

Rofes wrote about distinctions between liberal and radical conceptualizations of addressing homophobia and heterosexism in k-12 schools. Rofes discusses his childhood experiences with discovering he was gay. He states that he “believe[s] [his] moral development and the values [he] embraced may have been tightly linked to [his] refusal to conform to the proper image and behavior assigned to boys.” Children begin to discover who they are and develop their own self-identity and personality at a young age.

I believe that children should be allowed to express themselves how they want and develop into the person that they wish to be. In the next four years, I hope to be teaching at a school that is all inclusive. I want to work somewhere that promotes the growth of each person and encourages students to be themselves.