August 2014 - Parks & Recreation - 17

hiding their sexual identities (Kivel
and Kleiber, 2000). Although these
strategies may protect young people
from harassment, participating while
hiding one's sexual identity also denies the participant opportunities for
self-expression and belonging.
Discrimination also limits the opportunities of youth who identify
as LGBT to engage in leisure. There
are thousands of chapters of middleand high-school gay-straight alliance
(GSA) clubs in which LGBTQ youth
and their heterosexual allies come
together to support one another and
advocate for more inclusive campus
communities (GSA Network, 2009).
Many of these clubs have met with
considerable resistance from school
officials. Applications for club formation have been denied on the basis of
not being related to the curriculum or
accepted with significant limitations,
such as asking for a list of all group
members, effectively asking students
to out themselves and exposing them
to atypical treatment and harassment.
However, students in several states
have taken their school boards to court
and the students' lawsuits have largely
been successful to date (DeMitchell
and Fossey, 2008). As such, park and
recreation agencies may have a legal
obligation to provide services inclusive of LGBT youth, regardless of local viewpoints toward providing space
for those individuals.
Leisure can also be a space in which
young people of diverse sexual identities are supported and celebrated. Jones
and McCarthy (2010) described a gay
football team in the United Kingdom in
which members created a welcoming
environment by rejecting stereotypes
about gay men not being proficient at
team sports. Further, GSA membership is related to individual empowerment (Russell, Muraco, Subramaniam

and Laub, 2009) and the presence of
a GSA on school campuses is linked
with less truancy, smoking and drinking alcohol among youth who identify
as LGBT and their heterosexual peers
(Poteat, Sinclair, DiGiovanni, Koenig
and Russell, 2013). Therefore, welcoming youth who are LGBT may support
the missions of many local park and
recreation agencies related to promoting positive youth development.
Practitioners wishing to promote
identity-affirming experiences have a
number of options:
Create welcoming policies. Practitioners should ensure that sexual
orientation, gender identity and " any
other identifying characteristic " are
included in antidiscrimination statements so that current participants
who identify as LGBT are aware of
their rights, and future attendees can
see that your program is welcoming
to all people. Research has shown that
students in schools with welcoming
policies perceive their school to be
more supportive of diversity (Szalacha, 2003). Practitioners interested
in creating welcoming policies might
consult one of the 14 states with proposed antibullying legislation for students who are LGBT (e.g., Illinois,
Virginia and New York).
Educate staff members. Staff
training time should be devoted to
discussing key ideas within queer culture, such as the meaning of the word
" gay, " so that staff members are better
prepared to provide welcoming leisure
experiences. There are a variety of excellent, free resources available on the
Internet to assist with designing an
LGBT training program, such as the
presentations created by the Georgia
Safe Schools Coalition (2013). Vetting
sources with a local expert to ensure
the accuracy of the source used is
strongly recommended.

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Parks & Recreation

August 2014 - Parks & Recreation

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