Workshops Fuel Dispute Over Help for Gay Students : Education: Sensitivity training for employees on sexual diversity has supporters and critics debating how schools should handle the issue.

A low-key effort to help gay and lesbian students has rekindled a simmering debate over the role of schools in dealing with teen-agers’ sexual orientation.

At issue are two school-sponsored sensitivity workshops on sexual diversity for Long Beach school employees. The first was in January for counselors, the second on Nov. 11 for principals and nurses. The idea was to train district employees in helping and counseling homosexual students, and in discouraging insensitive actions or remarks.

Some gay rights activists said the training does not go far enough to help students. Members of conservative religious groups said, however, that they are worried that campuses will become recruiting grounds for a “gay lifestyle” they condemn as sinful.

Supt. Carl Cohn said that opponents of the workshops are overreacting.

“People think gays and lesbians are being singled out for special treatment,” Cohn said. “But this needs to be seen in the larger context of efforts . . . to make sure all helping professionals are sensitive to the needs of all students.”

The two workshops were among several designed to educate counselors and employees about problems facing diverse groups of students, Cohn said. Educators must be able to confront a wide range of problems, such as drugs, gangs, unwanted pregnancies or harassment, before they undermine children’s education, he added.

The explanation did not satisfy about 100 protesters who descended on the Dec. 14 board meeting after learning of the workshops.

Many labeled the workshops an insidious attempt by gay rights groups to make district curriculum support their agenda.

“The public schools are not a forum for this kind of debate,” parent Brad Franklin told the school board. “And the school district has no right to tell me how to raise my child.”

Several said that if homosexuality is seen as acceptable, students might be recruited into a “gay lifestyle.”

“You do not argue with me, you argue with the word of God,” said James Shaw, pastor of Lily of the Valley Church in Long Beach. Buoyed by resounding clapping and cheers, he spoke with a Bible in his hand and three young daughters at his side.

But proponents of help for gay and lesbian students say not enough is being done.

“Long Beach schools continue to be very slow to respond to the needs of gay and lesbian youth who are at risk,” said Wayne Trevathan, executive director for The Center, a Long Beach gay and lesbian resource facility. The workshops are “hardly enough response to this enormous problem.”

Parts of the meeting were a replay of a January, 1991, furor over a proposal drafted by gay rights activists to create a Long Beach version of Project 10, the counseling program for gay and lesbian students at Fairfax High School in Los Angeles.

Project 10 is named for estimates that 10% of the population is gay.

The Long Beach Project 10 proposal would have provided settings for students to discuss sexual orientation with adults and support groups. Gay-oriented information also would have been available. Supporters said that without such help, homosexual students sometimes drop out of school, attempt suicide or abuse alcohol and other drugs.

Homosexual student support groups now operate in 30 high schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District, said Project 10 founder Virginia Uribe.

The plan to create a Long Beach Project 10 drew vigorous opposition after it became widely publicized.

Advocates withdrew the proposal after most board members indicated they would vote against it. Then-Supt. E. Tom Giugni said he objected to Project 10 because it was developed outside of the district and because gay and lesbian students were already getting necessary counseling.

Uribe challenged the explanation. “The difference between L.A. and Long Beach is that when our (L.A.) board was attacked, they stood up to the right wing and said, ‘We will have that program.’ ”

Most Long Beach board members remain reluctant to support a concept such as Project 10. Board President Mary Stanton said she did not want to state her views on the workshops’ future “because the issue is so polarized.”

The school district developed what officials hoped would be a palatable compromise. Giugni authorized a sexual diversity task force, which concluded that the workshops were needed.

District anti-slur and anti-harassment policies are not consistently applied to protect homosexuals, said Barbara Lindholm, the Jordan High School teacher who chairs the task force.

Lindholm cited the case of an A-student who she said was struggling with his sexuality. The student dropped out of school after reportedly being rejected by his counselor and parents and harassed by administrators.

“He felt that there was no one there for him, and he dropped out of school,” Lindholm said. “He felt like: ‘All those horrible things they’re saying about me must be true.’ ”

Although no data is available, Cohn said significant numbers of gay and lesbian students have been targets of harassment and discrimination. The workshops provided an alternative for addressing the problem without adopting a more sweeping program such as Project 10, Cohn said.

Although no more workshops are scheduled, the task force will evaluate the sessions and present its findings along with any additional recommendations to the school board.

PTA President Marjorie Kinney said she supported the sensitivity training, and most students interviewed also favored the idea.

“There is hardly any tolerance toward gays and lesbians on campus,” said Jomar Isit, a 17-year-old Jordan senior who is openly gay.

On several occasions, he said, teachers witnessed students harassing him, and took no action. He said he would like to see the workshop training augmented by support groups for homosexual students.

“Students need to know that at least there’s something being done for them,” he said. “It’s my senior year and too late for me, but there’s a lot of kids who need help.”

Understanding sexual diversity benefits all students, Long Beach resident T.J. Miller told board members at the raucous meeting. She and many other gays and lesbians have been victims of violence and abuse, much of it from young people, she said.

“If we don’t teach tolerance and diversity, where are they going to learn it?” she asked.

But opponents view sexual-diversity training as a repackaged Project 10.

“They’ve renamed the same cat,” said Rev. Lou Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition, an Anaheim-based lobbying group opposed to homosexuality. “It was Project 10; now it’s sexual diversity.

“If they’re going to truly counsel teen-agers, it (should) not be into acceptance of a high-risk behavior,” Sheldon said. “To teach children to respect a dysfunctional behavior is absurd.”

The workshops are “a slap in the face to parents who have demanded that this be ended,” he said.

Many of those parents loudly booed teachers union President Jim Deaton when he defended the workshops.

“No student’s education should be jeopardized by intolerance,” he said. “We can’t let the prejudice of a vocal minority derail a much-needed effort to provide educational excellence to all students.”