A GLBT newspaper out of Boston, Bay Windows, wrote an article about a couple of the winners of the Elsie Frank scholarship. It just came out today online, and will also be in their current print issue. Here it is for all to see here:
"PFLAG event to honor safe schools activists"
As a senior this year at Pioneer Valley Regional School in Northfield, Elliot Holloway began coming out publicly as a transgender man, but he found that his school had few supportive spaces or resources for LGBT students. He, along with other students, decided to create one on their own and founded their school’s first gay/straight alliance (GSA). Holloway also tried to educate his classmates on transgender issues, doing a presentation on the discrimination faced by transgender people as his final project in his senior contemporary issues class.
“Where I go to school it’s not a very liberal place. GLBT people don’t fit in very well … They can be out, but they can’t flaunt it,” said Holloway. “And it’s hard for transgender people to be out and not flaunt their gender identity. But I refuse to be silent because that’s one of the worst things you can do in the queer community.”
Sammy Sass, a senior at Buckingham, Browne and Nichols who lives in Cambridge, also worked to make her school a more welcoming place for LGBT people and their families. As the daughter of two moms, Sass immediately gravitated towards the GSA but was disappointed at how small the group was. For four years she worked to raise the profile of the GSA, holding the school’s first Day of Silence, an annual event organized by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) to draw attention to the silencing of LGBT youth in schools. That first year, Sass said, about 12 students participated by remaining silent for the day, but by her senior year that number had grown to about 70; additionally, over 200 students wore stickers that day marking them as a supporter of the Day of Silence. The GSA was officially on the map.
“It was really important just to have a GSA and let people know it was there,” said Sass.
Greater Boston Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) will honor Holloway and Sass, along with three other Bay State high school seniors, for their work in their schools and communities by presenting them with the first Elsie Frank Scholarship Awards at the organization’s fifth annual Pride and Passion Party on May 5. Greater Boston PFLAG has presented scholarships in past years, but this year the organization renamed them after the late Elsie Frank, an honorary board member and longtime supporter of the organization and mother to Congressman Barney Frank. Her family, including Congressman Frank, will be on hand to present the scholarships.
The Pride and Passion Party, which will be held at the Boston Ballet Building, will also honor two trailblazers in improving conditions in the state’s public schools for LGBT youth: Jeff Perrotti, founding director of the Department of Education’s Safe Schools program, and Kim Westheimer, another former director of the program. The two activists used their experiences to write their book on creating safe schools, 2002’s When the Drama Club is not Enough: Lessons from the Safe Schools Program for Gay and Lesbian Students.
As for the next generation of trailblazers, both Sass and Holloway said they intend to continue their LGBT activism after they graduate and go onto college. Holloway said he ultimately hopes to become a community youth worker and help other trans youth. When he was first coming out, he said a transgender community worker in Northampton provided crucial support to help him through the process.
“I would like to make the kind of difference that the community workers I have known, to make the same kind of difference they made. They were there when none of my friends knew what was going on because I knew that what we talked about was between us … They’ve changed my life, and I think it’s time to give back,” said Holloway.
The Pride and Passion Party will be held May 5 at the Boston Ballet Building, 19 Clarendon St., Boston. The scholarships will be presented at a 5 p.m. reception, and the party will begin at 6:30 p.m. To purchase tickets or find out more call 781.891.5966 or visit gbpflag.org.
Linkage: http://www.baywindows.com/ME2/Audiences/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=Publishing&mod=Publications%3A%3AArticle&mid=8F3A7027421841978F18BE895F87F791&AudID=0813BC739F2044E5A03DCF2DE3FDF7C9&tier=4&id=C249932F475E4C2C84CCC664C74D4410
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