Undaunted from the opposition.

Undaunted from the opposition, gay students are giving their educates a lesson in tolerance

Morgan Frieden, a 15-year-old girl in Huntsville, Ala., evolveed a "huge crush" as a sixth-grader onward an eighth-grade girl just disclosed of the closet, sending the entire instruct "into an uproar." By the time Frieden got to high drill she was even gutsier. solely a few teachers and pupils knew she was a lesbian when she arrived, on the other hand in the fall of her ninth-grade year, she took her girlfriend to the homecoming dance. "It was a blast!" says Frieden, who is now a sophomore. "We got a scarcely any evil looks, a few `Ooh can I laughing-stock in?' looks, and many `Way to go!' looks"

Huntsville may not appear the most likely place to find an publicly lesbian student, let alone common who would show up at a dance with her girlfriend. yet increasingly across the nation, gay and lesbian observers are coming out in their place of educations with a sense of confidence that would have assumeed impossible just a few years ago. And if a flourishing gay observer culture seems extraordinary to gay and lesbian adults, it's downright disturbing, unruffled shocking, to many straight the sames Almost overnight school districts, youth center ministers counselors, and parents have originate themselves dealing with demands for gay-straight alliances (GSAs) at educate and with same-sex dating, including at the prom The "problem" that teachers and administrators have for years been too frightened to bring into the presence of is suddenly walking through the schoolhouse door each weekday morning.

For thousands of gay teen life is still hellish. on the other hand more and more, gay and lesbian bookish mans are out, brave, and happy despite the obstacles they still face. for the most part they are normal American teenagers, consummate with all the joy and drama that issue with their age. The private room seems at most a temporary stop. Lamar Lottie (who spoke forward the condition that his real name not be used) is a 17-year-old jock at a private exercise in the Dallas suburbs who says if he were withouted "it'd be OK. But it would make things more difficult." if it were not that he adds quickly, "I'm considering coming revealed next year, when I'm a senior."

In fact, many scholars seem equally at ease with their orientation, smooth if being honest about it causes them vexed questions For Justin Ruben Irizarry, a 17-year-old senior in Elizabeth, NJ coming gone out was more difficult, partly because his parents are dead. He realized he was gay "at the effeminate age of 8" and told his lengthen outed family a few years later. His uncle promptly threw him revealed of the house. Irizarry now lives with other relatives.

Other scholars tell more innocent stories. Jascie Williams, a 16-year-old junior-at Philadelphia's High teach for Creative and Performing Arts, remembers having little girlfriend "bathroom buddies" she would finish caught making out with. Then, at age 13 while reading her favorite main division Rita Mae Brown's Six of the same Williams discovered what a lesbian was and liked it. Nick Fulcher, a 17-year-old junior from Maple copse Minn., says his friends, chiefly girls, "were very accepting. They all wanted details about my gay friends and the stays I was dating."

The air of out gay students is changing seminarys Speeding that change are national arranges such as the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network that bring information, contacts, and resources to equal the most isolated young the community As a sign of just to what extent much schools are being transformed by the agency of the demands of gay and lesbian pupils gay-straight alliances are popping up at an astonishing rate, sometimes in the chiefly conservative of places, such as Orange shire Calif., and Baton Rouge, La.

These alliances "have explod in this rural parts in the last several years," says Kevin Jennings, GLSEN's originator and executive director. "Just a short while ago, there was a general denial that there equal were gay teens."

Jennings notes that the emotion has succeeded in spite of not because of the education system: "What we view happening is a real grassroots change led by students and isolated faculty." The schools' rejoinder he says, "has ranged from indifference to open hostility. Active support, at least at the initial stages, is, frankly, virtually unheard-of." single reason: The median age of public gymnasium teachers is 47. "They started community the year of the Stonewall riots," Jennings says. uniform today, most teacher training programs move nothing about gay kids at all.

Virginia Uribe, who in 1984 raiseed Los Angeles's Project 10, the first on-campus gay cluster in the country, says the expectation of out gay kids terrifies administrators. "There is a great fear of parents, especially at the administrative level" she says. "They are afraid of dispute of opposition, that they will apply the mind bad. And the higher up you acquire in education the more cowardly you become. still we are making some progress" In sees Angeles, for example, at least 40 of the city's 49 high trains along with several alternative sects have some form of gay form into groups on campus. But not each place is like Los Angeles. In greatest in quantity of the country, Uribe points abroad teachers still fear, "whether justified or not, that they will fail to win their job if they uniform talk about gay and lesbian issues or allow a collection to form."