This story by Thrives Youth & Tobacco Coordinator Bexx Merck originally featured in our June 2021 E-blast. To receive our monthly E-blast sign-up HERE.
Making Strides
What a year! For the first time in Thrives’ history, we concentrated our focus on substance use prevention within LGBTQ+ youth here in the West River Valley. According to the 2019 YRBS data, youth who identified as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and/or Transgender make up 14% of high school and 8% of middle school. And while Thrives wants to focus on what’s happening positively to support these students, we do acknowledge that LGBTQ+ students here are two to three times as likely to feel sad and hopeless, use substances, be bullied, and attempt to harm themselves. They are less likely to participate in afterschool activities, feel like they matter to their community, and feel safe in school than their cisgender and heterosexual peers. The good news is there are so many ways we can, and do, address these issues that LGBTQ+ youth experience.
Most recently, the VKAT (Vermont Kids Against Tobacco) group created a small campaign to increase the school’s awareness and knowledge of the LGBTQ+ community. A group of middle school students made signs to answer common questions or misunderstandings about LGBTQ+ people, like “what does LGBTQ stand for?” and “why should you never ‘out’ someone?” This will no doubt be a larger project next year. Their goals were to make sure people understood the value of LGBTQ+ youth in their school community, and to make these identities more visible and loved within the school.
We are all learning more about what prevention looks like within the LGBTQ+ community, but one resoundingly clear idea is this: open support from others is one of the biggest protective factors for LGBTQ+ youth.
“…family support and acceptance is associated with greater self-esteem, social support, general health status, less depression, less substance abuse, and less suicidal ideation and behaviors among LGBT youth. Family support is also associated with less substance use among LGBT youth. Among transgender youth specifically, parental support is protective against depression and associated with having a higher quality of life.” –Wise, Rosario, Tsappis, 2016
A Lasting Commitment
Thrives has also partnered with the district’s Student Health Action Committee (SHAC) to address gaps in health-related care for LGBTQ+ students as well as assess and identify school policies and practices that could be improved to be more inclusive of LGBTQ+ specific needs, as well as connect SHAC with educational opportunities.
Here’s a quick list of the rest of our work this year:
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- Formed relationship with advisors of the QSA (Queer Student Alliance) at Leland and Gray to restart group in the ‘21-’22 school year- we are planning a trip to a local Pride event for QSA members in September
- Creating conversations about LGBTQ+ identities and culture in our student groups, including introducing pronoun-sharing to group norms
- Utilizing support from and collaborating with Outright VT to connect West River Valley youth with Outright VT’s LGBTQ+ programming
- Advertising Outright VT opportunities to youth
- School projects to build awareness and acceptance of LGBTQ+ youth & identities as substance misuse prevention
- Collaborating with the Deerfield Valley Community Partnership (DVCP) to create more opportunity and connection between Southwest VT, Central Southern VT, and West River Valley LGBTQ+ youth
We are really looking forward to the next school year and following more of the guidance in Creating Safer Spaces for LGBTQ Youth: A Toolkit for Education, Healthcare, and Community-Based Organizations by Advocates for Youth. And most importantly, I want to express that supporting LGBTQ+ youth liberation doesn’t just uplift them, it uplifts all our communities. LGBTQ+ liberation includes that we all live a little more freely with more connection and support and fewer unfair expectations that limit our abilities to thrive. We firmly support the LGBTQ+ community and will be here to support and connect you, an LGBTQ+ loved one, or your town in building inclusive spaces, education, and relationships.