School professionals' perspectives on working with transgender and gender queer youth in the school setting

This qualitative dissertation study focused on the perceptions of school professionals in workingwith transgender and gender queer students. Twelve school professionals were individually interviewed utilizing a semi-structured format regarding their experiences working with transgender and gender queer students. School professionals were interviewed to determine: what effective practices/policies schools are implementing to support and meet the needs of transgender and gender queer students, what issues arise with these practices/policies, and what is hindering school professionals from utilizing the other practices/policies that past research has shown to be effective in supporting transgender and gender queer students. Three trainers of organizations which help school professionals better understand and support the LGBTQ community, specifically transgender and gender queer individuals, were also individually interviewed utilizing a semi-structured format in order to gather important anecdotal knowledge regarding this community. The primary researcher utilized Grounded Theory to analyze the data. The primary researcher gathered detailed knowledge and identified shared concepts from the participants’ interview responses, discovered themes, and then explored relationships between concepts in order to better understand socially constructed reality (Morse & Richards, 2002). Participants’ responses to the interview questions were transcribed verbatim and then coded using Corbin & Strauss’ (2008) approach to elevate the raw data to a conceptual level. Open coding was utilized to group similar data and categorize concepts, axial coding was utilized to link and organize these categories by discovering relationships among them, and selective coding was utilized to interpret the data through the development of relational conditions, interactions, and thereby explain the storyline (Scott & Howell, 2008). Interview data provided valuable qualitative evidence of school professionals’ experiences working with transgender and gender queer students and whether their schools have practices/policies in place to support transgender and gender queer students that past research has shown to be effective, such as: utilizing an LGBTQ+ inclusive curriculum, having LGBTQ+ safe spaces within the school, offering LGBTQIA-specific professional development trainings for staff, and utilizing a individualized gender transition plan. These data serve as a preliminary evaluation of school professionals’ experiences with transgender and gender queer youth and may inform current as well as future school professionals on how schools can best implement effective practices to hopefully create a safer school environment for these students.Psy.D.Includes bibliographical reference