The Seth Walsh Project. Its about friggin time.

The ACLU announced the creation of the Seth Walsh Project today. Seth was an 8th grade gay student in Tehachapi, a small town in the mountains east of Bakersfield, that hung himself when the bullying finally got to him. His family alerted the school administrative staff and the school board many times, prior to Seth's suicide, of the obvious and overt bullying by other students,but to no avail.  I wrote about him here, in a post entitled Bullied to Death-Seth Walsh's last words, and included the video at the end of this post.

The ACLU project's goal is to combat bullying of gay students in California schools. From their website:

All students have a right to attend school in a safe learning environment, and their parents have a right to know their children will come home unharmed. But sadly, that is not the reality in California. Far too often, teachers and administrators discount--or worse, ignore entirely--incidents of violence happening right under their noses.

Today, the ACLU of Southern California announced the launch of the Seth Walsh Students' Rights Project -- a major new initiative aimed at combating bullying and discrimination in California schools, particularly harassment directed at lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning students.

Prompted by the September 2010 suicide of Seth Walsh, a 13-year old student at Tehachapi's Jacobsen Middle School who endured years of anti-gay harassment at school, the Project will investigate incidents of harassment and discrimination; educate administrators and teachers of their responsibilities under both state and federal law to make sure all students have a safe learning environment; and work closely with LGBTQ students and their parents to ensure they have the same educational opportunities as their peers.

It's about fucking time. As the ACLU states, schools have an obligation to protect their students from bullying..of any type. They are obligated to provide a safe learning environment.

They failed Seth. The fuckers in charge failed this child miserably and to that end..my hope is that the ACLU will be a beacon in the fight for a safe learning environment for all children in California's schools.

I just wish it was a nationwide project..because we know it happens all over these United States of America, at all levels of education...and it has to stop. NOW. 

Democrats introduce bill to outlaw bullying in schools.

Congress Critters Al Franken and Jared Polis have introduced a bill to protect students from the hateful practice of bullying. This protection would extend to all students attending a federally-funded school. From Jurist:

US Representative Jared Polis (D-CO) and Senator Al Franken (D-MN) [official websites] on Thursday introduced legislation to protect lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) students in federally funded public elementary and high schools from bullying. The Student Non-Discrimination Act (SNDA) [materials] was reintroduced in both the US House of Representatives and the Senate [official websites] prompted by the suicides resulting from anti-LGBT bullying of several students in the past year. The SNDA is modeled after Title IX [20 USC § 1681 et seq.] of the Education Amendments of 1972 and would establish a comprehensive federal prohibition of discrimination against LGBT students in public schools. The act would also prohibit schools from discriminating against students based on actual or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as prohibit schools from ignoring harassment. If enacted into law, violations of the SNDA would result in the loss of federal funding and provide a legal cause of action for victims who encounter discrimination in public schools. The American Civil Liberties Union(ACLU) [advocacy website] supports the legislation [letter, PDF] and decries the treatment of LGBT students in public schools:

The recent tragic deaths of young gay students from across the country underscore the fact that LGBT students are an especially vulnerable population in our nation’s schools. Discrimination and harassment, even physical abuse, are often a part of these students’ daily lives. … The Student Non-Discrimination Act would have a profound impact in improving the lives of LGBT students by ensuring that discrimination and harassment of students on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity has no place in our country’s public elementary and secondary schools. 

The legislation was first introduced [HR 4530 materials] in the 111th Congress and currently has 99 co-sponsors in the House and 27 co-sponsors in the Senate.

Wow, makes me feel good to know that 126 people have signed on to co-sponsor this bill. Of course, the question I have is this: How many of them are republicans? Anyone want to bet the answer is zero?