EQUAL RIGHTS Youth Pride conference offers boost to LGBT students BY BETH SCHWARTZAPFEL

"Let’s go around the table. Each of you say what pride means to you," said Jenn Steinfeld, co-chair of Marriage Equality Rhode Island, the campaign to allow same-sex marriage in the state.

"Strength."

"Courage."

"To not be alone."

"The confidence to do what feels right."

Around the table were about 30 young people, gathered October 22 at the Met School for a daylong conference on "Queer Organizing In and Out of School." Organized by Youth Pride Inc. (YPI), a nonprofit Providence advocacy group for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, queer, and questioning (LGBTQQ) youth, the conference was the first of what organizers hope will be an annual event.

Steinfeld led one of the day’s seven workshops, "Locating the Marriage Movement in a Wider Queer Context," and it covered many of the key events in queer history, such as Stonewall, critical court cases, and the emergence of AIDS in the early 1980s. Steinfeld also touched on local gay history, such as the 1992 election as a state senator of the state’s first openly gay public official, Will Fitzpatrick. The workshops ran the gamut, from "Sexual Identity and Trauma: Healing Through Political Action," and "LGBTQQ Depictions in Television and Film," to "How to be a Playa."

The 70 participants ranged in age from 13 to 23, came from all over the state, and most are members of the Gay-Straight Alliance, or GSA, at their school. Most identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or queer. Seven percent identified as transgender.

Shelby Ferreira, YPI’s GSA coalition organizer, assembled the conference. "Young people don’t feel safe in schools," she says, "and that’s the bottom line." Ferreira says her goal "was that the youth would go home feeling like you’re supported, that you have peers who are feeling the same way as you, and that you can make a change."

Change, indeed, is necessary. For many of the youth who feel isolated at school and at home, this day was an opportunity to "let go of all that stress of having no one to talk to," says Isabel, 17, a student at the Providence Academy of International Studies, who says she is the only ‘out’ student at her school. "You got to YPI to find support, to find a family," she adds. Laura, 16, a student at Classical High School, would like to be out at school, but does not feel safe with the prospect. "At school, it’s not like you don’t want to be out. You can’t be out. At YPI, you forget about it. It’s like another world or something."

Emma Hardiman, 15, a student at North Kingstown High School, put it this way: "At school, sometimes I’ll refer to my ex-girlfriend, and people are like, ‘your who?!’ Here, it’s normal."