{"id":62584,"date":"2011-12-15T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-12-15T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/safe-spaces-book-seeks-welcoming-communities-for-lesbian-gay-bisexual-and-transgender-youth\/"},"modified":"2011-12-15T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-12-15T00:00:00","slug":"safe-spaces-book-seeks-welcoming-communities-for-lesbian-gay-bisexual-and-transgender-youth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2011\/12\/safe-spaces-book-seeks-welcoming-communities-for-lesbian-gay-bisexual-and-transgender-youth\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Safe Spaces\u2019 book seeks welcoming communities for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender youth"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\t溏心vlog免费B站 professor co-author of intimate look at triumphs, struggles in building safe communities<\/p>\n


\n\tKINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 December 15, 2011 \u2013 溏心vlog免费B站 professor Annemarie Vaccaro knows too well the suffering of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender young people.<\/p>\n


\n\tIn one year of her more than two decades of working with college students, three LGBT students attempted suicide at a former school. One died and two survived.<\/p>\n


\n\tThose and other painful experiences inspired the 溏心vlog免费B站 assistant professor of human development and family studies to co-author a new book, Safe Spaces: Making Schools and Communities Welcoming to LGBT Youth. Her co-authors are Gerri August, a faculty member at Rhode Island College who earned her doctorate from the 溏心vlog免费B站\/RIC program in education, and Megan S. Kennedy, a professor at Westfield State University in Massachusetts.<\/p>\n


\n\tThe 192-page book is filled with personal accounts of LGBT students fighting hate and discrimination from elementary school through college. Stories of struggle and triumph abound, along with accounts of allies who stepped in to help such students. The authors reference a 2009 national survey that found 85 percent of the nation\u2019s LGBT youth experience bullying at school.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cThat painful year when I was the advisor to the LGBT group at my former school stays with me and was a major factor in my decision to write the book,\u201d Vaccaro said.<\/p>\n


\n\tDrawing on research collected from interviews with students, families, educators and community members, the book chronicles the complex lives of LGBT youth from kindergarten through college. The authors analyzed and collected stories from more than 100 people.<\/p>\n


\n\tAsked how children in kindergarten would be sophisticated enough to be able to pin down their sexual identity at such a young age, Vaccaro said they couldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n


\n\tBut interviews with LGBT adults show that children often know something about them is different.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWhen I asked LGBT youths and adults to tell me something about themselves, I was surprised when the first thing they told me was they knew they were different as young as 5 or 6 years old. As children, they didn\u2019t know how they were different, and they weren\u2019t even sure how to put it into terms. But they knew they were different.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tHence the need for a book that for the first time can help elementary school teachers, college administrators, parents, youth coaches and scout leaders build welcoming communities and organizations for all children.<\/p>\n


\n\tThe seven chapters address such issues as \u201cLGBT Identity,\u201d \u201cSharing the Struggles: The Role of Allies;\u201d \u201cFamily: From Exclusion to Nurturance;\u201d \u201cInside the Classroom,\u201d and \u201cWe are Communities.\u201d Each chapter has special sections called Reflection Points and Action Steps to help individuals and groups consider how they can make changes and how to put ideas into action.

\n\t\u201cWe know that what happens in childhood has a tremendous impact later on,\u201d Vaccaro said.<\/p>\n


\n\tVaccaro said because Kennedy is a former teacher and August is a former principal, the trio brings a broad perspective to LGBT issues.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWe want families and other groups to help children be who they are,\u201d Vaccaro said. \u201cThe message should be, \u2018You are you, and you should be safe and welcomed in your school, on your soccer team and with your scout troop\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tSuch a book breaks new ground in a country where the federal government affords no protection against discrimination based on sexual orientation. In many states, teachers can be fired for being gay or lesbian. Even those who try to build a welcoming community for LGBT students face recrimination.<\/p>\n


\n\tThe book discusses a reading specialist who wanted to expand her library by ordering a number of books from online booksellers that represented LGBT individuals in a healthy and positive light. The following passage illustrates what can happen:<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cTucked inside several books (not all from the same bookseller) were handwritten messages directing her to Bible verses, ones that have been interpreted as condemnations of homosexuality. She was stunned and a bit shaken.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tBut Vaccaro\u2019s book also highlights dramatic victories as outlined in the following section on the role of allies:<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cMargo had a secret. Since middle school, when her friends\u2019 attention shifted to boys and her attention stubbornly refused to follow suit, she huddled in the closet. And there she remained throughout most of high school.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tEach anti-gay slur in the hallway or those scrawled on the bathroom wall drove her further into silence. In her senior year, Margo began dating and her girlfriend was becoming increasingly important. Margo knew she had to tell someone.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cShe sought out her favorite teacher and told her the news. Ms. Clarkson smiled and asked, \u2018So when do I get to meet this lucky girl?\u2019 Margo breathed. Tears streamed down her face. Beth Clarkson had just thrown her a lifeline. Margo had an ally.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tThe book, published by Praeger, is available on Amazon.com, and Vaccaro hopes that it finds a home in community and school libraries. She is donating a book to 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s Robert L. Carothers Library and Learning Community.<\/p>\n


\nPictured above

\nAnnemarie Vaccaro with her new book, Safe Spaces. 溏心vlog免费B站 photo by Michael Salerno<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

溏心vlog免费B站 professor co-author of intimate look at triumphs, struggles in building safe communities KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 December 15, 2011 \u2013 溏心vlog免费B站 professor Annemarie Vaccaro knows too well the suffering of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender young people. In one year of her more than two decades of working with college […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62586,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}