This workshop that we attended was put on by the head of GSA as well as the students who are apart of the group. I was grateful for the students to be bold enough to speak with us about these issues. I know that these are not easy topics to talk about but these students displayed poise, maturity, and courage to not only speak with us, but to be in this group at all.
I liked the workshop that they put on for us. There was a lot of information and I learned a lot from this. The first section we covered was just the vocabulary that these students use when talking about who they are. There are a huge amount of terms that I was not knowledgeable about. One thing that I learned about the terms is that there is a large amount of preference that the person can hold when selecting a term that describes their identity. For example, a person may not want to be considered bisexual, but rather pansexual (which means attracted to all sexes). This confused me at first because I thought they described the same thing, but the individual may choose what group they decide to be with. Every group has different connotations and it is the individual's decision to choose who they decide to associate with.
Another thing that stunned me was some of the percentages about gay teens or their discrimination. On stat showed that 60% of gay students hear discriminating remarks from staff. These stats talked about homelessness and violence. They were very severe and eye opening. Other exercises such as the personal stories were also very powerful and made us really look at the circumstances of the students through their eyes. I was glad to be able to attend this workshop. Again, I thank Carlsbad High School and the GSA Club for providing us with this opportunity.
I liked the workshop that they put on for us. There was a lot of information and I learned a lot from this. The first section we covered was just the vocabulary that these students use when talking about who they are. There are a huge amount of terms that I was not knowledgeable about. One thing that I learned about the terms is that there is a large amount of preference that the person can hold when selecting a term that describes their identity. For example, a person may not want to be considered bisexual, but rather pansexual (which means attracted to all sexes). This confused me at first because I thought they described the same thing, but the individual may choose what group they decide to be with. Every group has different connotations and it is the individual's decision to choose who they decide to associate with.
Another thing that stunned me was some of the percentages about gay teens or their discrimination. On stat showed that 60% of gay students hear discriminating remarks from staff. These stats talked about homelessness and violence. They were very severe and eye opening. Other exercises such as the personal stories were also very powerful and made us really look at the circumstances of the students through their eyes. I was glad to be able to attend this workshop. Again, I thank Carlsbad High School and the GSA Club for providing us with this opportunity.