Daviess County High School GSA Case Study

Students are becoming increasingly self-aware and finding their identities earlier than before (Poteat et al.). Daviess County High School needs a Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) as a club because it will bring awareness to the school’s diversity and create a safe zone. Having a GSA will make the school safer with education enlightening the minds of the students of the problems and solutions that are presented in the club. A GSA is an organization that will make the school a safer and inclusive place for students of all backgrounds. The organization relates to a number of students heterosexual or LGBTQ, the club builds leadership skills, and it increases inclusivity among groups.

As a pansexual student, I will feel an amass of security if Daviess County High School (DCHS) had a GSA. I come from a conservative family who is not open to the idea of the LGBTQ community.

My father has warned me that if I turn out to be part of that community that he will not have me in his home for he doesn’t want a “sinner” in a house of God. Therefore, if DCHS had a club like a GSA then the club will be a safe haven and let me talk to a person who understands and accepts me for who I am then I will feel more sound in my homestead because conversing with another person who will give me advice of how to approach my situation in an orderly manner.
According to data received from SurveyMonkey sixty-five percent of the twenty random people who took the survey voted that they would be interested in DCHS having a GSA while only thirty-five percent claimed that they had no interest in the club.

These results show that the students who claim they are not interested, maybe are just not participants in extra-curricular activities or they discredit that the LGBTQ community needs to educate others about the matters the community faces. A variety of people commented in the survey that DCHS needs GSA so people will appreciate the LGBT community and respect them more. In an interview I conducted the potential leader of the GSA Audrey M answered, “That the school should have the club because this is a public school and there’s separation of church and state so there is no reason that there should not be a GSA.” Although, another person in the survey wrote, “There is no need for a GSA since gay marriage is now legal,” but, that is not the goal of the club. The goal of the club is to be inclusive and create a sense of peace and harmony among students and

staff.
Gay-Straight Alliances promote “youth empowerment and positive youth development” (Poteat et al.) and “provide[s] [a] safe environment for LGBTQ and heterosexual youth to socialize, receive support, and engage in advocacy efforts… [and] leadership by providing opportunities to develop initiatives to address inequality in schools or communities”(Poteat et al.). Since GSAs provides empowerment of the youth the club will assist in the shaping of students into leaders, which schools encourages students to develop those skills. Providing GSA in DCHS would create well-rounded leaders. The Seven Habits (a leadership and decision-making program that DCHS participates in) wants of the students. GSAs will promote the fifth habit: seek first to understand- then to be understood through the advocacy and group discussions to understand one another’s situation. Also, providing a GSA would supplement a positive atmosphere for students and staff, making a safe environment reducing violence in school.