The sexual diversity climate of Massachusetts' secondary schools and the success of the Safe Schools Program for Gay and Lesbian Students

This dissertation is comprised of an introduction and two articles.; The first article investigates whether student perceptions of the Massachusetts secondary schools' “sexual diversity climate,” differs across schools, based on school-level of implementation of Massachusetts Department of Education's Safe Schools Program for Gay and Lesbian Students (SSP) and student-level sexual orientation. The data were collected from approximately 1,700 students in a stratified random sample of 33 secondary schools throughout Massachusetts. I evaluated student and school level effects on sexual diversity climate by fitting multi-level regression models using Proc Mixed (SAS). There was a statistically significant positive difference in sexual diversity climates associated with higher levels of implementation of the SSP. In schools where one or more of the SSP recommendations were implemented, students reported lower levels of homophobia/heterosexism for students in general, and higher levels of personal safety for sexual minority students. Even after controlling for school size, geographic region and SES at the school-level, and race, grade, GPA, gender and sexual orientation at the student-level, the positive effects of the SSP on SDC remained. Thus, I conclude that the SSP is positively associated with the learning milieu and with schools that are both safe and value diversity. The results of this study support the position that educational interventions: school policies explicitly protecting sexual minority students from harassment and violence; faculty and professional staff training, and a school-based extra-curricular group are associated with positive differences in school climates. Additionally, the results show that the student perception of sexual diversity climate is negatively associated with being a sexual minority member and with being male.; The second article refines the prior investigation. Having found a positive relationship between sexual diversity climates and the SSP, this paper examines the impact of the implementation of each of the program's recommendations on SDC, separately, and suggests educational policy implications based on the results. Each element of the SSP (Gay-Straight Alliances, teacher training and inclusive school policies) is positively associated with less homophobic school climates. Moreover, Gay-Straight Alliances have a stronger positive effect with the High School boys than with the girls.