LGBTQIA2S+ Student Success

If you have any inquiries, please direct them to the K-12 Curriculum Coordinator at rachellam@oregoncampuscompact.org

The Coalition of Racial and Educational Justice (CoREJ, fka Campus Compact of Oregon) aims to serve LGBTQ2SIA+ students by co-designing an intersectional racial justice curriculum and providing on-site interventions. These are intended to improve learning outcomes for BIPOC and LGBTQ2SAI+ youth by promoting a culture of belonging in Oregon schools. Students who experience layered and intersecting oppressions need support that affirms all aspects of their identity. Many students, and student advocates, don’t have the tools and resources that they need to address racism, heteronormativity, transphobia, and other forms of bigotry that impede student’s success. Using student-informed perspectives, CoREJ will partner with K-12 and community-based organizations to address chronic absenteeism, student academic engagement, and postsecondary access for our LGBTQ2SIA+ youth. Our work will center communities most impacted by systemic, institutional, and interpersonal racism and hate violence.  

The overall goal of our project is to improve educational outcomes for LGBTQ2SIA+ students by creating safe and affirming spaces; we will do this by providing free community education to students, educators, and administrators in our growing network . Through our workshops, we will support participants in advocating for their students through policy advocacy and civic engagement.  For those learning to describe gender expansive and diverse sexualities, wWe will include terminology and concepts that describe and affirm gender identity, LGBTQ2SIA+ history in Oregon, how race modifies gender, and bystander interventions to interrupt bullying and identity-based harm. We will focus on empowerment and counternarratives through the integration of LGBTQ2SIA+ & BIPoC histories, art, and literature.

Project Workshop Modules

• Advocacy: This module will focus on policy advocacy and ending hate violence and biased acts through institutional accountability, bystander intervention, and self study. Focused on self, students, advocates/educators, and youth.​​

1. Module part 1: Module participants will develop a working knowledge of past, current, and proposed legislation that address hate violence directed at BIPoC and LGBTQIA2S+ students and communities. State entitities like the Department of Justice Civil Rights Unit and Oregon Department of Education will serve as key sources of module data. Module content will provide regional and national data and best practices examples.
2. Module part 2: Bystander intervention
3. Module part 3: Personal/Healing work, self reflection, self advocacy, standing in one's power, building power in community, and mental health first aid.

• Empowerment: Counternarratives and LGBTQIA2S+ empowerment, self-care, collective care, and building power in community through collective action.
• Knowledge: Understanding and affirming gender-expansive identities and diverse sexualities for youth and students.

1. Module part 1: Module participants will understand and accurately use terms and language that uplifts and humanizes students.
2. Module part 2: Module participants will develop a working knowledge of the history of LGBTQIA2S+ students in Oregon.
3. Module part 3: Module participants will learn to have conversations around pronouns and gender identity with students.