Students and school staff that are perceived to be lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender (LGBT) frequently suffer from harassment that can have devastating effects on their personal, academic and professional lives. In 2000, the California Legislature passed The California Student Safety and Youth Violence Prevention Act (AB 537), which includes sexual orientation on the list of groups that schools are required to specifically protect from harassment and discrimination. Six years after the adoption of this law, a school-wide survey conducted at a mid-size suburban high school identified verbal harassment targeting LGBT students and staff as the school’s most prevalent form of verbal abuse. While the school’s administrators were referring repeat AB 537 offenders to in-school suspension, the school had no program in place designed to modify the behavior of these students.
This study investigates whether students who had repeatedly violated AB 537 would express a change in attitude about their behavior after reading of its harmful effects. The literature showed that reflective essays could be a powerful learning tool, but had not yet determined whether they could effectively modify the attitudes of repeat offenders. This is a qualitative action research project involving eight subjects. Essays for half of the subjects showed a change in student attitude after reading the materials provided. The study concludes with three recommendations for school leaders: take the threat of anti-LGBT harassment seriously; be careful to avoid unwittingly stereotyping LGBT and questioning students and staff, and try changing the attitudes of student harassers by combining direct instruction with reflective essays.