Bullied Gay Students To Get School In Milwaukee
by Doreen Brandt 365Gay.com from the Web. March 7, 2005
Milwaukee, WI -- Students who have been bullied and made to feel unwelcome in the school system will get their own school next fall in Milwaukee.
The concept for the charter school, which is publicly funded but has more autonomy and flexibility than most traditional schools, was approved last spring and planning is now underway.
The school will serve about 100 students, no all of them gay. Nicole Powers one of the teachers who helped devise the concept said the school would be open to all students who have been bullied or discriminated against.
Powers said a search for the right site has begun. The school will be called Alliance High School.
"Oftentimes the sheer size makes it very difficult" in traditional schools, Powers told the Associated Press.
Powers and Tina Owen, the other teacher who helped create the program, said that their goal is not to isolate or segregate victims, but create an environment where students feel safe, and can learn how to go back out into the community and fight discrimination.
Ashley Werner, a lesbian who has been a student at Milwaukee's Pulaski High School, said she intends to attend Alliance during the next school year.
"If you are even remotely different, (the students) harass and make fun of you," Werner told the AP.
Similar charter schools have opened or are in the planning stages in several US cities.
New York's Harvey Milk High was the first publicly funded high school for LGBT students.
Harvey Milk School opened in April 1985 in a church. There were 25 students and one teacher.
In 2003 it moved to its own building in Greenwich Village and has about 150 students today.
|
