Training educators to support sexual minority students: views of Chinese teachers

ABSTRACT

Good quality teacher education and training has been acknowledged as an effective strategy to reduce sexual prejudice against sexual minority (lesbian, gay, bisexual and questioning/queer [LGBQ]) students. However, no mandated programmes have been developed to include LGBQ-related content in teacher training in Hong Kong, a Chinese society in which heterosexism prevails. Based on the concepts of sexual prejudice, minority stress and contact theory, this paper explores the international and regional literature on LGBQ students’ school experiences, highlighting the significant role teachers play in supporting these students to transgress sexual prejudice, and presenting suggested themes and strategies for teacher training programmes, drawn from qualitative interviews with eleven Chinese teacher allies. Data analysis led to the identification of the following themes: 1) starting sexual diversity training officially; 2) reconsidering assumptions; 3) engaging with relevant cultural knowledge and skills; and 4) using dialogue as a training strategy. This paper argues that accurate content about sexual diversity should be incorporated into the professional teacher training curriculum, with updated sexuality concepts and prejudice-free, LGBQ-inclusive language relevant to the Chinese cultural context. Teachers need to become more aware of how sexual prejudice is manifested through cultural forces. Intergroup contact can be included as a useful training strategy.

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher training
• sexual prejudice
• heterosexism
• Chinese LGBQ students
• tongzhi students
• Hong Kong

Acknowledgments

The author is grateful to research informants for their trust, honesty and openness during the sharing of their perspectives. Special thanks go to Damon Ho who provided editing, translation and logistic support of the study. Thank you also to Barry Lee and Victoria Shui for providing peer debriefing guidance and community outreach support.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. In most Hong Kong Chinese gay communities, the term tongzhi (同志), meaning comrade, is preferred over the formal Western descriptor, homosexual (同性戀者).

2. The acronym LGBQ is used here for convenience. LGBQ informants are those who have same-sex attraction/behaviours and/or who self-identify as LGBQ/tongzhi. Although lesbian/gay/bisexual youth (LGB) and gender-variant/transgender youth (T) face social discrimination because they transgress gender norms, the challenges faced by transgender students (e.g., the process of gender transition and special medical care services) are in some ways different to those faced by LGBQ students and therefore require specific attention. This article uses the term LGBQ to avoid making the assumption that LGBQ students and transgender students face the same issues. Further research is needed to understand teachers’ support for transgender students in contexts such as Hong Kong.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the The Research Grants Council of Hong Kong [28401614].