Pioneering Queer-Inclusive Education: Andre Zarate on Building the House of Legends and Celebrating Identity in Schools

Bryan (he/they):
0:27

Teaching While Queer is a podcast for 2SLGBTQIA+ educational professionals to share their experiences in academia. Hi, I'm your host, Bryan Stanton, a theater pedagogy and educator in New York City, and my goal is to share stories from around the world from 2SLGBTQIA+ educators. I hope you enjoy Teaching While Queer. Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of Teaching While Queer. I'm your host, Bryan Stanton. I'm so excited to have with me today Andre Zarate. How are you doing?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
1:05

Hey, how are you? I'm doing good. I'm doing good, excited to be here.

Bryan (he/they):
1:09

I'm so excited to have you, so excited that I got a little tongue tied there, so that's fun. Why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself to our guests, our audience.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
1:22

Hi everybody. My name is Andre. My pronouns are he/ them/siyá. I am currently an adjunct professor. I was a middle school teacher for the last 10 years. Currently, I'm also just working on a really cool endeavor called House of Legends, where it's like a school model that centers queer youth, and I'm really just focusing on making sure that LGBTQ students are really seen in schools and that they're represented and that they have a space like that really focuses on themselves.

Bryan (he/they):
1:52

I want to verbalize this before we get on with the interview, that we need to make sure that we circle back on House of Legends because I have questions.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
1:59

Yeah.

Bryan (he/they):
1:59

Because it sounds awesome.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
2:01

Yeah.

Bryan (he/they):
2:01

Can you do me a favor, Because this is the first time that I've heard the pronoun Siyá? Can you just tell me a little bit about?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
2:08

it. Oh yes, great question. Siyá is a Tagalog pronoun from the Philippines, my family's from the Philippines, and I add Siyá at the end of it just as a reminder to myself that my ancestors pre-colonial Philippines, and the way that we've always looked at our language is that we didn't have binaries, and so what we use Shuh for, he her them. It was just the same pronoun for each one, so it's just a reminder to myself that that's where it came from. Those are my ancestors and I proudly wear the Shuh pronoun.

Bryan (he/they):
2:44

I absolutely love that and I love that so many cultures out there and so many languages world languages actually aren't in the binary. Yeah, I would love for someone to do a study of that, like just speaking out languages of the world and be like these ones are in the binary and these ones aren't. And then the next question is like why?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
3:06

Right, where did?

Bryan (he/they):
3:08

the binary get existed or put into existence Right.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
3:12

And you know it's one of the things that I'm doing. I forgot to add I'm also a doctoral candidate at the University of Pennsylvania.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
3:18

School of Education and my dissertation and research study is actually surrounding Philippinex queer youth and I've been doing a lot of reading around the history of the Philippines as it comes with gender and sexuality and how a lot of that stuff is kind of left out and forgotten, and so part of my study and part of like what I'm doing is like looking back into my roots so that I can really just live into my authentic power as a person, as a human being and as a Philippinex person.

Bryan (he/they):
3:50

I think that's so interesting. There's a couple of things that you said that I find fascinating. One I have not heard the ex applied to other cultures outside of Latinx, and I know because, I mean, I grew up in Southern California, I lived in Texas for a while, so I know a lot of people who would fall into the Latinx community and I've seen a lot of pushback about it. And also the development of Latin A, which is more consistent with Spanish and Latin languages, and how you would pluralize pronouns or people and whatnot, and so I think that's super cool, that all of us are subculture.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
4:34

Yeah, I will say a little bit of similarly to Latinx. There has been a lot of debate and conversation around it as well about how like, oh, we're like people want to stick with Filipino in it, but I, you know just like how I feel about shut, like I feel like it should just be applied and I let people make that decision. I like Philippinex because I feel like it's more inclusive, and so I just stick it on to a lot of the things that I do and a lot of the things that I say.

Bryan (he/they):
5:07

Yeah, I love that. It's funny. I think a lot about when this conversation starts happening. I think a lot about legally blonde. So for those like, in the movie legally blonde, there is a lesbian character who is a feminist and she has a conversation about gendered language. And so she starts complaining about the word semester and talking about it how it should be a vester, and that's an example of like where gendered language can create an issue, and what I think is so interesting is that nobody bats an eye for masculine gendered language.

Bryan (he/they):
5:48

Right right, human, mankind, all of those things are okay, but as soon as you start varying from that and saying something that might be different is where we start getting the pushback.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
6:00

Right.

Bryan (he/they):
6:01

And so you see that happening in lots of different cultures is not just English. Like even just the idea of like woman, kind or chair person, you know, like these things that are happening create a lot of like, a lot of stirring. It's like when people say things like well, we can't say Merry Christmas anymore, well, nobody's saying that, but like no one is saying that you have to say chair person.

Bryan (he/they):
6:25

We're just recognizing that this woman is not a chair man. This woman is the chair person. This woman is the chair, right, and that's that part, you know. Or this non-binary or transgender person is not the man, unless they are. That is being identified just by using gendered language. Right, right, right, so fascinating.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
6:54

Yeah, and I would say that you know, to add on to that, as we're talking about language, I feel like one of the things that I've been actively trying to do, especially since I've been going back into like looking up to my roots and using the pronoun and using Philippine X is like trying to remove gendered language from my language and my speak, and I will admit that it's really hard because you've been, like we've been raised to just continually say it, and so I openly admit I say this to all the time, to my students too that I'm going to make mistakes, and I would appreciate it. People like you know call me in on it.

Bryan (he/they):
7:28

Yeah, there's something I learned from my, my college professor and it's funny because it's like my second master's degree and I'm still learning new things and ways of approaching things and she said I'm speaking in rough draft and so like these conversations where we're kind of having to come up with things on the top of our head, like those are conversations that we're having in rough drafts because we didn't get to think about them beforehand, and that's where mistakes are gonna happen and the caveat is what you do after the mistake.

Bryan (he/they):
8:02

Right right, it's how you respond to it. That's important, whether it be about pronouns or if it's something with yourself. You just make the mental note of like oh shoot, I just used a masculine word when I meant to be more general than that.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
8:20

Right.

Bryan (he/they):
8:21

You'll have to remember that specific word and come up with a solution for it and try to work it into my vocabulary.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
8:28

Right.

Bryan (he/they):
8:29

It's just about how you respond to it, but I think you're right on point with that. It's like we're gonna make mistakes and it's important to learn from those mistakes and move on.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
8:39

Right agreed 100%.

Bryan (he/they):
8:43

So let's talk a little bit what it was like for you as a queer student.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
8:49

Yeah, you know I always start off talking about how, when I was younger, I feel like I knew pretty early that I was different from what a lot of my classmates and peers were feeling, and so, as a preface, I went to basically I went to Catholic school my entire life K-8, 9-12. And so there's a narrative that's always pushed in Catholic school and ever since I was younger and I say this in a lot of my speeches in second grade, that was the first time someone called me trigger, warning, content, warning, a faggot, and it has always stayed with me every year after that and, to be quite honest, like I felt, like I've heard that word being thrown at me every year, even as an adult, and so what it makes me think about when I was younger was that the feelings that I had about myself were wrong, or I desperately wanted a change and I consider myself a very creative person.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
10:01

I love the arts and I knew that when I was younger, like I loved drawing, I loved music, I just liked being in that realm, being creative, and that showed up a lot in play and as an educator. Now I'm a big proponent of imagination, as a pedagogy and because that goes away somewhere in our childhood where we just like no longer use our imagination. And when I was younger I was always playing around with what the societal norms were, what Catholic school was telling me or what I was feeling from my family and the people around me. Like I wanted to play, dress up and I wanted to wear that dress, I wanted to dance around to some of my favorite music, but I was being constantly told by people around me no, that's not what a boy does, we don't do that. And I was constantly made fun of for it, especially when I was a kid, and one of my favorite things is me and my friends used to play Power Rangers.

Bryan (he/they):
11:06

And I was just thinking about this Go on.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
11:10

We used to play Power Rangers all the time and I wanted to be the Pink Ranger. Every single time I was like I don't care what you want, but I'm gonna be the Pink Ranger. And people be like that's not a boy color, that's not a boy in it. And I was like I don't care, I'm gonna be the Pink Ranger. And so I'm the Pink Ranger every single time and I'm actually proud of little Andre for sticking by that a lot. And I'll also say that when we were younger we had like GameCube and Nintendo 64. And when we played Mario Kart I would always pick Peter, daisy or Birdo as my character. I just wanted to be them.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
11:48

But I kept constantly being told like you can't, you can't, but I still chose them anyway. So, little Andre, thank you for sticking by that decision. But what I mean by like being constantly told is that throughout my childhood I kept thinking, damn, like, why do you think this way? Why are you like this? And you internalize like there's something wrong with you. And I'll be honest, like that kind of stayed with me all the way through high school. I didn't actually figure out or like do start doing that self-healing work until I got into college. Like that's when I started like accepting more of my identity. I met more people who were like me and so they kind of like helped me out with that. But a lot of my childhood was like burdened with, like trying to be somebody. I wasn't.

Bryan (he/they):
12:35

Yeah, so there's a lot there that I like. For those of you who are listening to this podcast and did not see me freak out on camera, as soon as you started talking about playing imagination, my head went to like oh, I used to remember playing outside and I was always the Pink Rager and I was always Storm from X-Men.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
12:56

Like and.

Bryan (he/they):
12:57

I was like 100% okay with it and like living my best life, and so as soon as you said that, I was like heck.

Bryan (he/they):
13:05

Yes, that was also my reality at the time.

Bryan (he/they):
13:11

And then, like, as you went on, I just started thinking about my own experience and how, like I had queer experiences in high school and I started to come to terms with myself and a couple episodes ago I talked about a genuine experience of like queer euphoria, which actually happened here in New York City.

Bryan (he/they):
13:33

The first time I came here was, like the first time I felt like 100% I don't have to hide who I am, because every single person on this trip with me knew who I was. Right, yeah, and so then I went to college and I'm just thinking back at like my first queer student union meetings and whatnot, and the group of friends that I got from that and the camaraderie that happened, and I'm just going, yep, so that's a lot Like I had these queer experiences and I had this queer identity when I was in high school, but like it really didn't blossom until college. And so many of us have that experience and to some extent, I'm really happy about the time we're living in right now and seeing how that experience can happen earlier in life, because what you had to be 21. To figure out who you are like that's crap.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
14:25

And I think what's interesting too is like I think about, especially in the I want to say middle school years, as I think people started to recognize I mean I was recognizing it. I think people were starting to recognize that I was different. They started I was put into more sports, like I was like forced into playing sports. So I played hockey, soccer and I felt like a lot of this was trying to make me a little bit more tougher, cause that was just how?

Bryan (he/they):
15:02

how do you? I mean, they didn't, they didn't put you into like a basic sport, they put you into a contact sport.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
15:07

Yeah, contact sport, but the only sport that stuck with me out of all the sports that I played was tennis.

Bryan (he/they):
15:15

Not a contact. Sport, not a contact sport.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
15:17

I remember when it was the only one that stuck. But yeah, like I just remember, like even I was getting advice from some of my friends. They were, like your hands are too loose, you need to like clench your fists a little bit more. And so I always took that as like a symbolism for, like I was like holding it all in when I was younger, like always like trying to, like when I I would remember catching myself whenever my hands were just free flowing and be like oh, I got to walk like this, or like have my hands like really clenched. And I think I was like super obsessed.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
15:53

And also, around puberty, like my voice was higher than others and so when puberty was happening, a lot of people were like you're not going through puberty, you're not going through, and I was like really conscious or people made me really conscious that I felt like I had to exert to people that I was a man which is like not the case anymore, like I don't care what you think. But back then it was just like a lot of my childhood, a lot of middle school and just a lot of the surrounding just made me feel like I had to do that. And, not to mention, I went to an all boys high school, and so that played a huge role in the way that I felt like I had to carry myself in high school.

Bryan (he/they):
16:39

So you have this kind of culmination and I've talked about intersectionality a lot with other folks in the podcast Do you feel like there was a lot of crossover in that kind of self consciousness, coming from being both Catholic and Filipino?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
16:55

Yeah, 100% definitely. I felt like you would attend Mass or you would be in classes in Catholic school where they talk about how being a homosexual is a sin. It's not okay. I remember I could just remember one of the textbooks, like having it italicized, and I would read it and I'm like no, that's not me. I had to convince myself that it wasn't me and then, because a lot of Philippinex families also were, raised.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
17:32

Catholic. It was just like a taboo topic. We were not going to talk about that, and so I felt like a lot of, like you said, the intersections with my identity just made it I feel like a lot more harder for me to just, like you know, really showcase who I am and showcase myself. And even when I let people into my life in college, when I was like I was starting to tell people slowly and actually even that situation was pretty chaotic as I remember it I still felt like I had to play a game like two roles, because I was out to people in college but I wasn't out to people at home, and so it was.

Bryan (he/they):
18:17

it was like still, I was balancing back and forth and code switching in many different situations For sure I once like I think it's interesting that there and I am not of either of these cultures, so I can be very wrong in saying this, but most of the Philippinex people that I know are are Catholic and there's like a strong Catholic influence and like I once had a girlfriend. This one time I had a girlfriend. Multiple times I had a girlfriend, but the specific instance, I had a girlfriend who was Philippinex and Catholic and at the time I was not coming out to people with my queer identity, we had broken up for whatever reason, and she slapped me because I'm pagan, I'm a Wiccan and quoted you know, thou shall not suffer a witch to live. And I just started like that was my. It wasn't my introduction to Catholicism because, honestly, my introduction to Catholicism was my, my grandmother's Latin mass when she died her funeral.

Bryan (he/they):
19:29

And I was like look at all the statues up there and golden and shiny clothing and they're singing and whatnot. But I just found that so fascinating. It was my first understanding of like how the teaching of Catholicism can can impact people, because I didn't grow up in organized religion and I'm very thankful to my parents for that, because I do believe that I would have had a lot harder time- with my own queer identity had I been in that environment.

Bryan (he/they):
20:07

But it was such an interesting, poignant experience and we're great. Now she and I are Facebook friends. It's fantastic, I've helped her with stuff with her kids Like it's fine. But it's like this vivid memory and it's like it's the thing I associate with Catholicism in Philippinex people and thank you for introducing me to this term because I'm going to actively work on it. Yeah, vocabulary during this episode Nice.

Bryan (he/they):
20:37

So you started kind of really coming of age not coming of age, but coming to terms with your identity in college, and so now you're an educator, yeah, and how do you think that your experience as a child kind of helps shape your interactions with your students?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
21:00

Okay. So I always tell people and I talk about this a lot that when you come out or let people in once, that it doesn't end there. It just keeps going and going and going and like so. Every stage of life there is a letting people in scenario and going into the teaching profession. When I first started out, I will admit I was so scared, even though I had just came from college and just let everybody know that I identify as gay and I'm part of the.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
21:36

LGBT community. The minute I stepped into the classroom to the teaching world, I went back in, and I think the part of the reason why was I first taught in a school in Chicago, and this is a little bit of like. Oh I like had some flashbacks, even though we were a public school. We were housed in a Catholic school right next to a Catholic church, and so the students who predominate the students and families who predominantly joined our school went to that church, and so I already had so much anxiety about being myself when I started as a teacher that I never talked about it.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
22:23

So I, being transparent, in the beginning I was just like. I pretended that I wasn't and I know, and that was like a survival tactic, you know, like it was just kind of like I just didn't want to go through all of the or at least what I thought in my head as all of the, all of the issues that I thought were going to come up because of that. Mind you, also within those I was at that school for six years. In the first two years there were also some other queer teachers that were open and out and I just saw a lot of backlash. That was really harmful, I think, for me to see as a queer teacher and I was like, oh, it's not safe to just be out like that, and so I kept it in a lot, although my students we talked.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
23:12

I taught the same group of students for four years. I had them from fifth grade to eighth grade and in the in the fifth and sixth grade year, a lot of them always are just like who's your girlfriend? Ooh, like all that stuff. Then, I think mid sixth grade, they just stopped asking. So sixth or eighth grade, it was just like no one ever asked me, ever again. And so I still am in contact with a lot of the students that I taught from my original class and they were just like we knew. We just didn't talk about it. We just didn't talk about it either and also and I felt you know, thinking about it, I was just like oh, and also um, I didn't give people or I didn't get obviously like, I just was like scared for my own and just like from my past history as a child and in school, I was really afraid to do it.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
24:00

What really changed is one day my mentor, my mentor teacher, shout out to Caroline James, she we were having a conversation about it in a meeting and she said to me I can tell you're holding a lot in and I can tell like you're just not yourself. And I was like, yes, you know, I was just she's. Like you have so much infectious energy and the students see it, but like you're missing a piece, like you're missing the whole, like, um, just being yourself and openly saying it, unapologetically, and I and I, you know I explained to her. I was like I'm like afraid to do that. And then she asked me the question that I that like changed my mindset around this. She said I just want you to think about how, what message are you sending to queer youth when you're not talking about your identity? What, like, what the message that you're sending them is? Oh, I'm supposed to hide, I'm not supposed to talk about it. And then it hurt even deeper because she was like I just want you to think about little Andre, if he was sitting in your classroom and like experiencing what you experienced and knowing and thinking like, oh, I think my teacher is queer. And then you're just like not talking about it.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
25:29

And I remember going home and I was like in tears, like I went through this whole like thing and I will be honest, like it took me a year or two to fully embrace that and fully like I'm going to do this and I'm going to be really unapologetic about it. And when I did and I put my first pride flag up and I introduced myself in he them pronouns and I talked about my identity, it was just such the sweetest relief that I felt, because then I could just be a whole me in in the classroom and the fears that I had around people are, the backlash that I was going to get, just wasn't there. It just wasn't present. One thing that I've learned is that a lot of the students and families that I worked with in the communities, they just loved me so much that like that's not the core, like that one thing wasn't going to change our relationship as a community.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
26:34

And I would say that I was sad that it took so long. But I would say that I'm really appreciative of that journey and of that moment with my mentor around flipping the question around like, what message are you sending? Because as teachers, as educators, we're definitely role models and they see what we do and they can pick up those subliminal messages, whether we like it or not. And so that was just such a pivotal moment in my teacher identity.

Bryan (he/they):
27:04

Absolutely. I'm just thinking that she gave you, like that RuPaul's Drag Race moment with, like the little picture, like what would you say? It's a little bit like so you got a finale moment, as it were.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
27:19

Yeah, I did have a finale for that.

Bryan (he/they):
27:25

And it also got me thinking like this is dear dear folks at home. This is where my ADHD comes out is that like people start saying things and then my brain goes to song lyrics because I've always been like a singer, musician and and I you know I teach theater and musical theaters involved with that.

Bryan (he/they):
27:46

So I just started thinking about Steven Sondheim and I thought about Into the Woods and it's this wonderful song called Children Will Listen, and it's like careful the things you say. Children listen and the other part of that that's not included in the song is children will see what you don't say, and I think that's so important. Also, like the point that your mentor made is really poignant, because I think that that's even more noticeable and especially when you have a world that's full of Bishander syndrome and horrible things are happening but nobody feels that they have to step up and say something about it, that goes noticed. It's what perpetuates the Bishander syndrome is because nobody is saying that, nobody's actively saying this isn't okay, and so I think that's so like what a great mentor to have.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
28:44

Congratulations on that. It was funny because it was just like one of those situations where she was just like, yeah, we're not going to talk about test scores today. We're not going to talk about I want to talk about you, because I've been in your classroom for so long and I'm noticing something that's missing. And we had that. It was such a deal is like one of those like after school three hour conversations that I think really pushed me to think differently about like my purpose, and even through the small things like hanging a pride flag in your classroom, is life changing in many ways.

Bryan (he/they):
29:24

Absolutely, and I think there's another. There's another part of that too. I just I finished. A couple months ago, I led a PD for an organization that was on identity in the classroom and how you show up in your classroom, and so we walked through, you know what does identity mean?

Bryan (he/they):
29:41

and I gave several, you know definitions, including Dr Seuss. And then and then I asked them OK, so give me your one second, one minute identity. This is who I am. And I said great, one. Did any of you feel uncomfortable sharing any of that information? No, ok, to what one thing can you take away from that list and still be yourself? And they said nothing. And I said, ok, great, now let's talk about queer identity. Queer identity is one part of someone's whole identity and lots of people are asking us to take it away from our teaching. Take part of ourselves, away from ourselves for the sake of teaching and still be the same person. Right, right Cannot be done, right.

Bryan (he/they):
30:39

Now it's a simple, like nobody said I'm heterosexual, I didn't even say that I was. I was queer. I said I'm a father, I'm a husband, I host a podcast called teaching, while queer my pronouns are they? He they like? I never explicitly said I was queer. I just started naming things about me.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
31:00

Right.

Bryan (he/they):
31:01

And it's just one aspect of our personality and I find it so frustrating when people are like I don't know why it has to be your whole personality. I'm like it's. It's not my whole personality. First of all, who doesn't love rainbows? Right? If you don't love rainbows. You have, like, a serious problem.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
31:18

Yeah.

Bryan (he/they):
31:19

And then and to like have you looked at yourself and really understood how heterosexuality is your whole personality, right?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
31:30

Right.

Bryan (he/they):
31:32

Because right now you're telling someone that their queer personality is their whole personality for the sake of being queer.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
31:38

Right, so right.

Bryan (he/they):
31:41

It's an interesting thing. It is one portion of who we are, and yet it seems to be the thing that is most talked about.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
31:49

Yes, and especially, I think you know I often think about, like as an educator, how easy it is for a lot of my colleagues who identify as hetero to share their getting engaged, their having their getting married, and how queer people are expected to hide it and not talk about. That's not a conversation that we should have. I literally the person next door just told everybody about her and her husband. So I'm confused about, like why my milestones or queer milestones don't count. And I was in a like I had a colleague who had a similar, like a situation that really broke my heart around, like sharing good news, and it really it really tainted the way I thought about like oh, I really have to straighten up as a teacher and not share much of my identity, but I was really hold on.

Bryan (he/they):
32:53

Hold on. I really want to point out something that you said. We've been talking about language. I really have to straighten up what I say about myself. Language man, yeah, crazy.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
33:08

And it's and it's and I say that intentionally as a like. That was where my mind was like going and it was it's always, it's always. It has been really hard to undo, but that was like when I saw somebody else hurting or when some other traumatic moment was happening. I was like no can happen to me and I did all the things that I had to do to protect myself and myself.

Bryan (he/they):
33:33

And here's the thing like I can tell, I can tell a classroom full of kids that I have a husband and all I've done is tell them who I love, right, the teacher next door tells me that she just got pregnant. She literally just told her students that her and her husband are fucking, yeah, that they're having sex, right, and like that is mind boggling to me. That makes this huge disconnect. Because we love baby, everybody loves babies, like y'all. The students know how babies are made.

Bryan (he/they):
34:06

Right, and if that's an okay conversation to have, because I'm not saying it's not, then me sharing basic information about having a spouse should be fine across the board.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
34:21

It's interesting. So I'm glad you brought that up, because actually there is another situation where a queer couple at my school said they were having a baby and then there was a lot of backlash, like that's not a conversation that we can have, but it's like the what you just said about, like someone saying that they're pregnant, like what One of them?

Bryan (he/they):
34:49

one of them, the direct result is sex. The other one is either adoption or science Right.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
34:57

Right, right, it's interesting that they're. You know that you brought that up. I always think about the double standards that we're having around, like who can say what and who gets to share their, their life, who gets to be authentic about their life, and it's just kind of like. But I'm just so glad I'm now like out of that place and that I'm so I've been more comfortable with myself that I could and that I'm able to share my identity and really the worth the way that I want to work.

Bryan (he/they):
35:30

You talked a bit about having seen like experiences for other queer teachers that had to deal with anti-queerness and anti-queer behavior. But have you ever had to deal with anti-queer behavior yourself, either from students or administrators or parents?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
35:47

Oh yeah. So actually what's interesting is, I think the older I got, the more I picked up on it, particularly from adults. I didn't really get it from a lot of the students or from a lot of the youth. I think I built such solid relationships with families and with students that that wasn't really an issue.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
36:10

But I think I encountered a lot of colleagues who didn't like that I had the flag up, didn't like that, didn't like that I was hosting a GSA at the school and actually there was this one instance and this one actually like messed with me a little bit. I was like teaching a lesson from broad to specific and I actually used my dissertation topic as an example where I talked about, like LGBTQ people is a very broad topic and so I wanted to narrow it down to Philippinex, queer youth, and so I showed them how, like you narrowed it down, and one of the teachers heard me teaching broad to specific in that way and said that it's not up to me to be talking about that in the classroom. It should be the parents who say it's okay, because if I had a child in your classroom and you were teaching that, I would pull them out and it literally isn't about the queerness, though it's about the process.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
37:18

Right and I was telling them like I'm using my dissertation as an example because I want to show you that I still use this as a 30 year olds in grad school. I am still using relevant. Right, it's relevant. And the funny thing was is that they all got it. Like they were like got it and like they started downing their research projects and I was like great, great lesson. But then teacher had pulled me aside and said that if their child was in my class, that they would pull them out.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
37:47

And I was like I was like confused about the feedback I was getting and it was funny because they were like I'm an ally, trust me, I'm an ally. No, I don't know, I don't want my children knowing about that unless it comes from me. And I was like I don't know, but that one messed with me a little bit. I'm not going to lie Like I won, because they directly said it to my face during a prep period and I was thinking about it for months Like I couldn't stop those conversations that happen during prep periods like really stick with you.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
38:28

They're the worst.

Bryan (he/they):
38:30

I had one. I had my prep period at the first period of the day and I had one like right before I was going to get ready to teach everybody.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
38:37

It always happens right before you're done.

Bryan (he/they):
38:39

Mess you up Right.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
38:41

Right, always right before you're about to teach, because I was about to teach right after that too. So I was like a little frazzled and I think the lesson I changed the topic because I was just like really frazzled.

Bryan (he/they):
38:55

That, and that's the stuff that really bothers me is that we do it consciously or subconsciously. We follow the feedback even though we don't agree with it.

Bryan (he/they):
39:03

Right, you know what I mean, because I found myself doing stuff like that, when I would give feedback, I would sub like personally, it was subconscious, I subconsciously removed queer identity from certain things and it was just I don't know. And in retrospect I was really angry with myself. But I didn't do it on purpose, right Like I just internalized this information, this feedback. Right, you know, and in hindsight, or you know, having you know a witty theater teacher on hand is always helpful. But I had to turn to her and been like I would like for you to look at the term performative ally ship have a great day. Yes, do you always have that moment where you're like dang, I just kind of with the best comeback? But it was like three o'clock in the morning two days later.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
39:50

But what I will say is the one thing that really kept me going there was. That was a school that I just I was in Chicago for years and then I moved to a different school in a different city and I did put my pride flag up and proud. I even on the first day of school I had like some rainbow outfit and I just remember some some of the queer students that ended up joining the GSE later walked into my classroom. They weren't even in my class. They walked into my classroom. They looked around and I felt like and I always talk about this like they, I got this code word. That was what we see you, you see us. They walked in and they were just like it's so bright in here, I love it, it's so bright in here. And that was like a code word to both of us, where we were like okay, I see you, you see me.

Bryan (he/they):
40:40

I got you Like um, and it was great yeah, because I think about like a lot of what I try to do is to be a beacon.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
40:50

Right.

Bryan (he/they):
40:50

Like a beacon of light, and so if to get that feedback would be like so meaningful, because that's what I was trying to do- Right.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
41:00

You know, it was my favorite feedback and I always stick that in my brain when I do this work. I think about the four of those students who came in and set it together and I was like, okay, I'm going in the right place, right direction, for myself and for them.

Bryan (he/they):
41:18

So so you got this wonderful advice from your mentor. I want to turn the tables now and put that you in the position of being the advice giver. So you're talking with a teacher who's coming out of their student teaching. They're ready to go into the classroom, but they're unsure if they should be their authentic self.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
41:36

What kind?

Bryan (he/they):
41:36

of advice would you give them?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
41:39

It's funny because I feel like I would give the same advice my mentor told me, which is think about the messaging that you're sending your students when you step into the classroom and what you said around um, children will listen and also listen to things that you don't say, Um, and things that they pick up on that.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
41:58

But one thing that I'm also really cognizant of and I've given this advice so many times before is I always tell queer teachers be aware of your environment and assess your own personal risk, how much risk you want to take, and I say this because it's all fine in Dandy for us to be like, yes, I'm going to be out, I'm going to do all those things, but if you're in a system or a school that just doesn't support that you have administrators who don't support that Um, and you have colleagues that are, and you're just by yourself on an island, I wouldn't do it, Um, I would actually recommend that you find a different school, because that's not the place for you to be at and also, um, that school shouldn't exist.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
42:42

If that is um a mindset that is being transferred over from staff member to staff member and um indirectly and directly being transferred over to youth around this idea about how LGBTQ people should be represented in schools, and so I always tell people to assess their environment, assess um what their admin is like and their colleagues. Before um sharing out your full identity, you always just want a group of people who will support you, Um, and that could be parents as well, Um, because a lot of parents and community members had my back um in a lot of those years.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
43:22

And in my opinion um parents and community is always greater than admin 100%.

Bryan (he/they):
43:32

I I agree with that entirely. It's funny like I got this messaging when I started at my first school. That was like the community is so important. If the community doesn't like you, then you won't be here long. And then I got the same messaging from some parents, like we're not really quite sure what you're doing in with your program and we want you to stick around.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
43:53

And it was like a subtle.

Bryan (he/they):
43:54

It was like a subtle threat and I was like, okay, well, I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing. And I stayed there for a while and I became the teacher of the year and I had all of these things and for the most part, the community loved me. It's that that small portion of the community makes a lot of noise. They don't like something right and it was enough noise for me to want to leave.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
44:16

Yeah, for sure, 100%, and I always say, um, you do want to find a place where, again, you have people who will back you up, but like they is more than acceptance, it's just um, they really just like nurture you and love you. And I just want to say this y'all, because I just learned about this the other day. I mean a year ago, I used to say to myself I just want to be accepted. And then I found these like layers of like not even acceptance of for LGBTQ people, like what should you receive? And I found out that acceptance is only in the middle. There's like four more levels that I was so unaware of and I was like, oh, that is exactly what I need is like I want to be nurtured, I want to be like all these different words and I was like, wow, I had a low bar going with like I just want to be accepted in a lot of these places.

Bryan (he/they):
45:12

I talked about this on the very on the last episode. We talked about how like we're in a much better place. We moved on from tolerance.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
45:19

Yes.

Bryan (he/they):
45:20

And now we're here at this place, this middle ground which is acceptance, and I'm like great, let's push for affirmation, which is like a step up right, yes, but then there's all these other things. There's so many other things above that. Teachers love a hierarchy.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
45:37

Oh, yes, they love a hierarchy, but I will tell you I was shook because I was just like wow, I was really aiming for the, for their minimum.

Bryan (he/they):
45:48

Absolutely. I talked with a college professor Gosh, it must have been like three or four episodes ago who mentioned this hierarchy with like nurture and affirmation and all these things above acceptance. Now I was like shoot. People keep telling us acceptance is what we should want, but it's literally the fair minimum at this point, yeah.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
46:09

And so I guess to the educator, I wouldn't aim for acceptance, like I would aim for something much higher, like there are schools out there that will affirm you, that will love you and they will nurture you, and you should go find those schools.

Bryan (he/they):
46:23

Absolutely, and so, then, that brings me to my next question is what do you think that the school community can do to be more inclusive of 2S, lgbtqia plus people?

Andre (he/they/siyá):
46:34

Yes, so this was all. This is like part of the reason why I'm doing House of Legends work as well.

Bryan (he/they):
46:41

Great, this is a good segue, because that's the next thing we talked about.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
46:45

So GLSEN, their national school climate survey, where a large percentage of LGBTQ students say and this was their headline that schools are hostile and not safe for LGBTQ students.

Bryan (he/they):
46:59

That's an exception. I remember seeing that.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
47:01

Yeah, that is so unacceptable. And back to our conversation about acceptance I think schools are not even at acceptance. That's a threat. Tolerable, like at bare minimum. We're at tolerance, and so I. So when you ask the question, what should schools do? There's a lot of things schools should do and I think a lot of prescriptive things they think they should do are pronouns bare minimum. Like that should just be there. The gender neutral bathrooms, that should be there, like all those things should be there.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
47:42

Doing the nice PDE about LGBTQ people in the beginning, great, but it has to be more than that. And so I'm in a little of a space where I don't even I want school systems to be fixed, but I'm learning a lot of how schools are broken and they're just repeating the same thing over and over again. Make things a little bit better and then they go back a little bit. And so I'm into the space of let's create our own spaces, like let's start creating schools that are queer centered and that schools that are run by queer, queer teachers, queer educators, and like it's a school for everyone, but we're centering our queer youth in the middle.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
48:25

And so I think a lot about school changing or creating new schools, but I also I'm thinking about, like, third spaces and in some cases, how do we work alongside with schools to create these spaces as inclusive rather than just, oh, another check off my list. We did pronouns check, and so that's always my answer when they're like what should schools do? And at this point I'm like I think we should create our own spaces and I think that in history, that's just what it is Like we don't see what we see in the norm. So let's create our, let's do the revolution.

Bryan (he/they):
49:10

Kind of right there with you on that, and it's funny because this episode is like repeating so much of the last episode that I just had, because I'm just sitting there going like, yep, queer schools. That's where I see it. And imagine like if we did that, how many people would be like oh, the audacity that would be something like that, but meanwhile like Christian schools and Catholic schools and Jewish schools and any kind of like group I mean homeschooling is predominantly religious, like granted queerness is not a religion. I mean wait grumpy.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
49:46

God.

Bryan (he/they):
49:46

Jesus beautiful.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
49:49

Yes, I do want to share House of Legends. I was, I was. I got green lit to open it as a micro school in Chicago. So I was ready. I was ready with the crew, I will say, if it wasn't for my other mentor, caroline Hill. She, I was in an innovative micro school program and my first iteration of the school was just a regular school, because that's what just my thoughts were. And then she said to me your innovation is found in your story, think about it. And I was like I hear you and I'm doing it. And so I will say, during that process I was getting a lot of feedback from people around.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
50:31

This is too unapologetic, like you're not. It's not going to open. You have to frame that it's for everybody, even if it's for centered for queer youth. Like a lot of language had to change and I didn't change it. I left it all in there and I did get green lit, but then March 2020 happens and everything just flew out the window. I waited a year and a half and they ended up using the funds for COVID relief but fair and I was so sad because then now I've been on this journey of like, how do I bring this back up? But I am excited because I'm just doing a lot of pilot work at this point and I'm trying to imagine and reimagine schooling and education in a way that doesn't mimic what we're already seeing in our schools.

Bryan (he/they):
51:22

Yep. I'm here for that, and when you get to piloting in New York City, you give me a call because I will definitely join the ranks on that one.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
51:28

Yeah, yeah, yeah Are you from New York City. I live in New.

Bryan (he/they):
51:31

York City. I'm from Los Angeles, but I'm here now. At this point I want to turn over the mic to you and give you the opportunity to ask me a question. So take it away.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
51:45

Yeah, one question I'm thinking about is what? Okay, so what? What kind of school describe a school that is queer centered to you?

Bryan (he/they):
51:58

Oh gosh, I don't even know, because you got me thinking about like pedagogy and the changes in pedagogy over time and how like we went into this, like pedagogy, changes with the workforce kind of, and I feel like one in a queer environment. I think that it's almost backward. I think of Greeks and I think of how the humanities were a top priority and the humanities were learned and expressed through the arts. Yeah, so I see a lot of art happening and while I do think math and science and all of those things, the core subjects are still a requirement, I think that there are ways to express them differently than they're being expressed, and I think that by unlocking creativity, utilizing artistic minds right you'll actually find that impossible problems will get solved.

Bryan (he/they):
53:11

Yes, because we're thinking more creatively, as opposed to kind of reproducing the things that have always been done. I mean, what an 11 year old solved? An impossible math problem the other day or a couple of months ago, I don't remember, but this you know young child solved this incredibly impossible math problem that people have been working on for maybe their whole careers, and I think that if we unlocked that creativity, problem solving will become a lot easier. I also think that the school would be community focused. Yes, and so I think that there would be, because queer communities have had to exist out of necessity in hiding. This would be a place where queer community to exist, not as a necessity but as a requirement of like of growth, not of living Right.

Bryan (he/they):
54:13

Yes, and I think what will be beautiful of that is the repercussion of that in adulthood is that the queer identity won't be entirely linked to alcoholism, because a lot of queer identity is linked to alcoholism, because our queer communities existed within hidden bars for so long generations and generations, and so then, by creating this community at a younger age, we're actually able to instill what the community could look like in the future. So those are kind of like things that come to my mind because I think, I don't know, I'm not here for, you know Socratic seminar or whatnot, though I do think that that has a place within this kind of setting. I'm here for understanding. As a theater teacher, there are things from all of the curriculum, from every class, that can be expressed through performance, art, or through building something, or through making a costume or painting or creating a song or whatever the situation is. You can express your knowledge in a creative way, and it will be actually more effective to your learning and retention of that information than you pass the test.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
55:33

Right.

Bryan (he/they):
55:34

Facts 100%. Well, Andre, I've really enjoyed our conversation tonight and I just want to thank you for taking some time out of your evening to sit and talk with me today.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
55:45

Yes, thank you so much for having me. I was so excited and really happy to have this conversation with y'all.

Bryan (he/they):
55:51

It is my pleasure. Please hit us up on social media with more updates of the House of Legends as things move along, because the people are going to want to know.

Andre (he/they/siyá):
56:00

Yes.

Bryan (he/they):
56:01

And then thank you all for tuning in to this episode. Wherever you are, I hope you have an amazing day. Bye, thanks so much and have a great day.