Charles Koehler 0:04 I'm Charles Koehler, and this is Lambda Reports, a program by and for the St Louis lesbian and gay community. The pressures on teachers and students in today's public schools is enormous, with issues of drugs, violence, teen pregnancy and illiteracy as part of everyday classroom life. However, when the student is lesbian or gay or thinks they might be, the situation can become particularly serious. I welcome to Lambda Reports, St Louis public school, Supervisor of School Social Work Services. Mr. Harold Player, welcome to Lambda Reports. Harold Player 0:44 Thank you, Charles. It's pleasure to be here. Charles Koehler 0:45 Great. First of all, why don't you tell us a little bit about what your school crisis intervention team does? Harold Player 0:53 Okay. Back in 1985 Charles, we felt the need to have trained a group of people who could go to schools that might be experiencing a crisis or pre-crisis situation brought about due to any act of violence, drug abuse, attempted suicide, death of a student, death of a particular staff member, etc. We want to train people to go and provide a service to try to calm that environment and bring back to the classroom those students who might been might have been caught up in that particular crisis. So that was brought about through a series of training sessions, and we now have in place since 1985, spring of 86 in fact, special trained team of people who go in and do crisis intervention. And from that point, we also focus back on that school or that particular child, that particular family, some prevention kinds of activities so that we avoid any future, pre-crisis, Charles Koehler 2:01 So you take a preventative stance whenever possible. Harold Player 2:05 Absolutely, we see that as being very crucial to our effort. Charles Koehler 2:08 Great. Teen suicide, you mentioned that is is a leading cause of death for youngsters, but it's a particular, particularly important concern for the lesbian and gay teens last fall, for instance, in a landmark federal Health and Human Services report, it concluded that, quote, "Gay and lesbian teens are two to three times more likely than non-gay adolescents to attempt suicide." End quote. It also cited that up to 30% of all completed teen suicides are by lesbian and gay teens. The study went on to blame, quote, "a society that stigmatizes and discriminates against gays and lesbians." End, quote, how is the the St Louis public school system with all of the other concerns that it has, how is the public school system addressing this disproportionately large number of lesbian and gay teen suicides? Harold Player 3:11 Well, Charles, fortunately, we have not had to deal on a specific level as gay teen suicide problems because we treat all children the same. And within any population, you might have that youngster that's experiencing a degree of depression, brought about by a number of things. Could be brought about because of economics of the family. Homelessness, we have children in shelters that attend our schools, brought about through peer pressure, etc. We really have not had any opportunity, I guess, to even zero in on that particular issue. I feel a little at loss at this point, the children that we have addressed in terms of meeting their needs and making referrals to the appropriate resources have been not so identified, we do not go about targeting that kind of child. We just treat the need, and if the need is such that requires intervention by the team, an outside referral, we make that right away. The key here is to identify the problem as soon as possible, the degree of depression and take appropriate action, and certainly we utilize agencies such as the Life Crisis Services program to help counsel these youngsters in conjunction with their parents. We just simply have not had an opportunity to look at that specific issue, if that's an issue. Charles Koehler 4:42 Could you give us an idea of approximately how many students there are in the St Louis public school system. Harold Player 4:51 We're about 45-46,000. Charles Koehler 4:54 And then if we use the commonly-quoted Kinsey figure. we're talking about approximately 4500 students that are predominantly homosexual. And then out of that, there's probably some additional students that are going through a common phenomenon during the teen years in which students are exploring their and discovering their sexuality as a whole. So we're talking about fairly sizable number of students there. The, getting back to the Federal Health and Human Services report that we were talking to earlier. It's strongly recommended, and I'll quote, "an end to discrimination against gay and lesbian youngsters and an initiation of high school programs that would be supportive of their needs." End, quote, how could the St Louis public school system respond to this federal recommendation? Harold Player 6:01 Well, you know, in curriculum activities, Charles, I would suspect, and I'm not an expert here, sure we address issues of gender identification. We … Charles Koehler 6:12 Can you tell us how those are addressed? Harold Player 6:14 Well, nothing specifically, but certainly in the classes that the students are exposed to at primarily the middle grades and the high schools in particular, it's a very open kind of discussion approach, and we deal very openly with issues as such as gay rights and gay opportunities and gender identity in those classes. If you ask me specifically how we structure that I can't tell you, but my point again is that we make no differentiation as to the child's sexual identity when it comes to a problem such as a suicide threat, we deal, we listen. Our techniques, typically is we go in, we listen very intently. That's one of the critical skills in crisis intervention, especially as you're dealing with an attempted suicide. We listen. We hear what the child is saying. We do not disown the fact that this child is serious about the threat. We provide supportive statements. We contact their parents and we reassure them that life is worth living and that suicide is a final note for anybody. That's typically how we go in and approach that particular problem. I can give you one example, Charles. We had a little 10 year old girl in one of our elementary schools. The age range has really dropped in terms of identifying these problems. Few years ago, this child had several problems that caused her to seem depressed. We happened to get the case in our office, the Personnel Services Office through a call from a principal who had been contacted by the child's mother. This child had just entered menses, was experiencing her first menustration. She had a mother who had been raped when she was in her late 40s. So she was a child of a rape. She her father was black, her mother was white, so she had an elderly mother, 10 years old, entering that critical stage that young girls go through, and having that peer pressure. So one morning, the mother went to the store. She was keeping some young babies for extra money. They were very poor, and when the mother came back, this child had slit her wrist. So the mother panically called the principal and the principal call our office, and we dispatch the school social worker over as soon as possible. It'll make a long story short, we got this child into treatment at St Jude, St Louis Children's Hospital, and she's doing fine now, great. So that's the kind of support I'm trying to suggest here. No matter what the gender of the child is, we really look at the specific needs and the feelings that the child is expressing, we listen very intently, so we are pretty accurate as to what appropriate measures we're going to follow. And then we team up with the outside resources, and we follow up all of our cases by working closely with the family, keeping track of the child within the school setting, because we see through statistics, statistics that girls more likely are will attempt suicide and never carry it through than boys. So in cases of females, we make sure that we keep track of that child throughout the the school year as well as ongoing. Charles Koehler 9:40 And I take it you've had a fairly good success rate with that. Harold Player 9:43 So far. We, I'd be honest, I know of no cases that start out as attempted suicide cases that end up in a final note. Charles Koehler 9:52 Great.. Harold Player 9:52 So we're very pleased with that, and we attributed that to not only our team efforts, but certainly to the school staff. Charles Koehler 10:00 You mentioned that the issue of depression, which is, of course, common for anyone, but when children are experiencing a lot of peer pressure and a lot of pressure from their students, that that can really lead to a lot of depression. One of the commonalities for many of our listeners and people out there that happen to be lesbian or gay, that they can readily reflect back to is the school days in which they experienced harassment and intimidation and violence directed by them. Some people make a strong case that by teachers and administrators allowing harassment of lesbian and gay children to continue in the school setting, that this is clearly an identifiable form of emotional child abuse. Do you have any thoughts on that? Because Harold Player 11:02 I would agree with the perception that if it happens, it's certainly child abuse, harassment. Charles Koehler 11:08 What is the school's policy on allowing this to happen, because, I mean, we can. Harold Player 11:13 It's very scanous(?) Charles Koehler 11:14 It's very common out there. Harold Player 11:16 Well, it's certainly not coming in our schools. I can assure you that, because in my role as a supervisor of social work services, working in tandem with counselors, school nurses, principals and other practitioners, we stamp out, anywhere we see, any evidence of such harassment, Charles Koehler 11:35 discrimination Harold Player 11:36 discrimination, et cetera. We recognize the trauma that can result from that. We recognize that that child, given that kind of pressure, cannot learn in that classroom, cannot study and become the person that he or she wants to become. We do not tolerate it. Our policy is simple. We do not tolerate it. If we identify any case where harassment is taking place or discrimination, we wipe it. We deal with the people who are involved, whether it be a teacher, whether it be a principal, whether it be some other practitioner or a parent, in many cases; you'd be surprised how many parents put pressure on their own children about changing their sexual identity. And it goes back to the old days as my kids, I have four children, and they're always talking about "Dad, that was the old days," but I think it's a new era in terms of addressing the issue of gay rights and responsibilities, and we try to teach that to our children and all of our schools. We certainly in-service our teachers and our school staff to be watchful and mindful of those attitudes that might crop up. We're human beings. If they crop up, we want them, them to deal with it on the spot. Charles Koehler 12:49 Great. We only have just a few minutes left. Just real briefly. Can you give us an idea what the City School Board's policy is on hiring or retaining teachers thought or known to be lesbian or gay. Harold Player 13:01 it's certainly equal opportunity employer, Charles Koehler 13:05 Okay? And that's simple writing, and absolutely have no reason at all to be concerned. Okay, that's that I'm sure is reassuring to many of the lesbian and gay teachers that are out there that might be listening. What advice would you give to our lesbian or gay youth in just the minute that we have left? Harold Player 13:25 I was it's advice I would give to anybody. And you know, being a person of Black heritage, I can tell you, when you come face to face with harassment, intimidation and prejudice, deal with it in a very assertive style, and key in to those attitudes, to the extent that you can either try to correct it yourself, work with that person, try to educate them, but certainly get that person help. The person that's discriminatory in their attitudes and practices needs help. So I would treat the person that's doing that in an assertive kind of way, in a helpful kind of way, realizing that that person simply is just reacting based on ignorance and intolerant style of behavior. Charles Koehler 14:14 Great. Well, it seems that from the Federal studies and other supportive evidence that your department's work is more than cut out for. Harold Player 14:24 Certainly, 46,000 youngsters, Charles Koehler 14:27 It's quite a few that, plus, unfortunately, that's all the time we have for today. I'd like to thank Mr. Harold Player from the St Louis public schools for being our guest, and if you have any questions, comments or suggestions regarding sexual orientation and our public schools, you can call 865-4550, that's 865-4550, that's weekdays, and voice your opinion. For Lambda Reports, this has been Charles Koehler, tune us in again, same time, same station. Transcribed by https://otter.ai