Interview with Sheryl MacMath

Question: How do you discuss sexual orientation and gender identity in your classroom?
00:00:05
When I was a grade 2-3 teacher, it was really interesting. The little kids that would come into my class because they're coming with all of their experiences at home, and they have this idea that what happens in their home happens in everybody's. And that everybody's family looks the same and that's just not the case. So, my main job was to teach them about how things were different in different families. Different people had different jobs; different people had different family constellations. And different people identify in different ways. And so, I would teach that there are families with two dads or two moms. I would teach that there are families with lots of family members and some with not a lot of family members. There are some that engage in and talked about Christmas and have traditions around Christmas, others it's Hanukkah, others it's Diwali. And recognizing that these differences are amazing and beautiful, and we see them positively. We don't look at it and go, oh, well, you're different than mine. That's not right. Because that doesn't make students feel welcome. That doesn't create a safe space in the classroom. That's my number one job, to make sure that every child who comes into my classroom feels like they belong there, feels like they're respected there, and are able to give that respect to everyone else. And that they're not assuming that everyone has to be just like me to have value. And that's really the focus that I had in grade 2-3. It's not telling kids what they are. Or going into explicit detail about different things, it's about making sure that they know how to create a space where everyone is valued.

Question: What is the purpose of teaching about SOGI, as you see it? 
00:02:02
I think it's really important to realize that SOGI or sexual orientation gender identification isn't explicitly in the curriculum. That's a resource that was designed for teachers to help them with what they're teaching in schools. So, when we think about curriculum, it falls in PE and Health and within PE and Health, we look at a lot of different things. We look at bullying, we look at mental health, we look at emotional health, we look at social well-being, all different aspects of it. So, when we think about SOGI, what we're referring to is learning about sexual orientation and gender identification in a way that helps everyone feel included. And that's really the key part of it. We have members of our society who have been bullied. Who have had increases in suicide. Who have had a real challenge with regards to feeling as though they belong in schools and in society, and that leads to a lot of health crises and mental health crises. And that's really what we want to address. We want to create a society where everyone feels included, where everyone feels supported and where they can bring and figure out their authentic selves... figure out who they actually are. It's not about teaching students to be a certain way. It's not about saying this is what you have to do, or this is what you don't have to do. It's about saying who are you and how do you want to be present in the classroom. How do you want to be present in society? And how can we make you feel included and safe in this classroom? And that means teaching all students in the class about the fact that there are many differences in families. We have single parent families. We have extended families that are raising children. We have families with multiple different constellations. So, we teach about the different kinds of families. We want to teach that there are different ways that students identify themselves. What are those different ways? We want to teach students that there's a lot of diversity in the world, and this is a good thing. This is a benefit to society. This is how we solve the really complex problems that we have in the world. But it's first about recognizing that diversity is a good thing and that we want to have space for it. A respectful, inclusive space for it in classrooms so that we can have it throughout the entire country.

Question: What do parents need to know about how SOGI is addressed in schools? 
00:04:35
I think first and foremost, parents need to recognize that teachers are happy to have them come to class and ask the questions. So, what are you teaching my child? What is going on in class? Most often, teachers actually send notes home to say this is what we're going to be doing. This is the language I'm going to be using. Teachers aren’t interested in hiding anything from you. We believe that parents and guardians that families and communities are an important part of the education community as a whole. So, we welcome you to come into the school, come in and talk to us. Ask us. We're happy to share with you so often the assumption is that we're doing something negative or we're doing something harmful or we're trying to do something behind your back and that's just not the case. We're not going to react well if you come in and you're yelling at us. Nobody reacts well when someone comes in and yells at. But we would love to have a conversation with you. So first and foremost, come in and talk to your teacher, because different teachers are going to do things in different ways, but bottom line, what we want is for your child to be successful. We want your child to feel happy. We want your child to be able to bring everything amazing that they are into the classroom and into society and we want to help support them as they figure out what that looks like for them, not for us, but for them. So please think about teachers the way we think about parents and guardians. We think about you as collaborators. We think about you as partners in supporting the most important people in our communities. Our children.