Gay teachers

Reading The Slog this turkey day, a gay teacher laments the fact that she cannot be real with her students. Gay people have been teachers since the beginning of time and it's time we got over it.

My fourth grade teacher, one of my favorites, Miss Smith is/was gay. I didn't know this until I became an adult, and saw this teacher with her partner at the state teacher's convention.

Did her sexuality diminish her ability to teach 4^th grade? Not in the least.

She was still the cool teacher who wore yellow, bell-bottomed pant suits with platform heels; had a stuffed armadillo in her supply closet and could be coaxed to tell us interesting stories of her travels to exotic locations like Mexico and Puerto Rico.

I loved her for her kindness, ability to tell a great story, and because she helped me conquer my division tables.

But the teacher in the Slog story laments that she couldn't share one of the happiest moments of her life with her class, an engagement, even if she wanted to because she would be fired. And this to me is sad. Miss Smith had a partner, and she could never talk about her in class.

Why are we so squeamish about living arrangements? I don't share intimate details with my students. Why would we expect a gay person to do so?

It is not a problem if a public school teacher is divorced several times, or has children by several different fathers. So why is it a problem if they are gay?

Teachers are human beings with family issues, economic setbacks, drinking problems, and come in all shapes and sizes. And some of them are gay -- not that being gay should be an 'issue'.

When we see upstanding members of the community who happen to be gay -- teachers, psychologists, doctors, bankers, plumbers, – we see reality, not the made-up, sexually promiscuous, perverted lie that some religious and conservative people would have you believe. Who has a gay agenda???

Let's let the gay teachers come out and be real. It will let our children see the reality of living as a gay person, a normal, boring, hard-working existence.

George Takei Calls Out Anti-Gay Arkansas School Board Member

This is classic. Takei, in his best elocution, calls Clint McCance a "douchebag". I almost spit out my coffee.

Shellfish = Gay?

"And what religious people have to reconcile themselves to is dropping it, dropping, ignoring what the Bible says about gay people the way they ignore what the Bible says about polyester and lobster and figs and shrimp and women."  Dan Savage on Big Think

Anderson, You Stay Classy

As always, Anderson Cooper brilliantly cuts to the center of the Clint McCance issue: " We think you should see his face…We think you should know his name. Clint McCance." I love what he's doing. He's routing the bully out of his electronic groundhog hole. Expose the haters for who they are, otherwise they'll just keep up the hateful rhetoric.
Later on in the interview, one of the graduates of Midland High School, Anthony Turner is interviewed. He is a formerly bullied gay kid who was advocating for wearing purple to in Midland. He said, that he likes the It Gets Better campaign, but, "We have a responsibility to make sure that it gets better now.. We have to look at our public policy and a situation where hate like this, where this kind of horrible conduct can come from a public official and nothing can be done about it." He goes on to say that in rural communities, gay kids "have nothing" no PFLAG, GLSEN groups to go to.
This is why individual educators have to step up and state the case for them.
Later on in the broadcast Anderson interviews Rosalind Wiseman author of Queen Bees & Wannabees, an anti-bullying advocate.
Money Quote: "What he (Clint McCance) is doing is fundamentally anti-child and anti-education. And what the colleagues around him have to be able to say 'this cannot stand' and if we don't do that…then we lose credibility with our own children."
We educators must use our platform to make gay okay.
If you didn't wear purple last week, then do something else to improve conditions for gay kids in your school.

Update-- Yes!

Arkansas school board member is resigning.  He says, "I give everyone a chance and try to love everyone".  Yeah.  Right.  I would suggest not using hate-speech to show your love next time.  http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/10/28/arkansas.anti.gay.resignation/index.html

School Boards

Where do I start? School board members often come to the table with one or more issues or agenda: (And I may be jaded about some aspects of education but I remain passionate about my students, what I teach and the daily duties of being a teacher)

• Narcissists (good for supervising children)
• men with Napoleon complexes who want to rule tall women (teaching is still a woman-dominated profession)
• micro-managing mothers who don't think their kids can graduate or get a proper education without some special muscle
• adults who had bad experiences in school and want to be in charge of the teachers who once bullied them (because telling a child to sit down and be quiet so the rest of the class can learn is clearly out of line…)
• parents who don't want their kids to ever know anything about sex because "abstinence education" will definitely prevent all teenagers from having sex
• Wearing-their-religion-on-their sleeve "Christians" who do not understand the separation of church & state – yes, the first amendment controls what a school can & cannot do and your religious affiliation has no bearing on what the public school does or does not teach (or what the library does or does not shelve).
• passive-aggressive nut jobs who hold grudges against " lazy" teachers who only work 190 days a year (I wish!)and get better health benefits than they have (this is very helpful for contract negotiation)
• community members who think most teachers only hold jobs because they have tenure (have it easy), not because teachers take their careers seriously
• citizens who think they have to save the district's students from the teachers who are merely "book smart" and not "street smart"
• business people who think should serve schools should serve their interests and believe that schools produce products

and a few good people who have no agenda and really want what's best for the students, district and community.

(Don't get me wrong, I think that local control is important for school districts, but my district, like many others is having a hard time finding people to fill board positions)

And then there's this guy who apparently who ran for the school board to increase the audience range of his bigoted rhetoric: (thanks for the tip, Kathy!)

Where do I start? The fact that 6 people "liked" this message is appalling. I don't know much about the good people of Arkansas, but I think this idiot's giving them a bad name. On the other hand, the Facebook page asking for his resignation has 14,000 members.

This guy is why kids think it's okay to be bigoted against gays (and to use bad grammar!). If those who are supposed to be running the district are like this, how could the kids think differently? And how could they possibly learn to use the proper pronouns?

And since when should one kill oneself for sinning? So-called Christians (not to be confused with the actual forgiving Christians): Ur doin' it wrong. And school board members: You have got to educate all kids in a public school system, even the LGBT students. You don't get to pick and choose the students any more than the teachers do. Please remember this when you create policy.

A Teachable Moment

Rep. Barney Frank, the only openly gay U.S. Congressman (and a force of nature) says that the recent suicides of gay teens is a teachable moment? Yah think?