Banning LGBTQ Education Blocks LGBTQ Economic Advancement Part 2

TRANSCRIPT

Horizons podcast – Seasons 3, Episode 5 Part 2 Philip McAdoo and Taylor Sprague

Philip McAdoo

It's just the fear of the unknown, right? We make assumptions about people and their identity. What are you? Who are you? So that we can then project all the things that we think you are. And for some people that's a lot of work. It's a lot of work just to let people exist. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

That was educator and activist Dr. Philip McAdoo discussing the continued fight for LGBTQ rights for students, and the educators who are responsible for their growth and development. Welcome to the Horizons podcast. I'm your host, Tameisha Bridges Mansfield. McAdoo sat down in front of a live audience at South by Southwest EDU with my colleague, JFF Director of Strategy, Taylor Sprague, who joins me today in the studio as we queue up the second chapter of this important two-part conversation. Hi Taylor. 

Taylor Sprague

Hi Tameshia, thanks for having me back. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

I'm glad that you are here. So, Taylor, there is a lot of serious talk in this series. So, before we jump in, let's just take a moment to celebrate because it is Pride Month, right? Do you have any special plans this year for Pride? 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah, absolutely. My partner and I are finally settled into a new home in the Catskills Hudson Valley region of New York, a place that is both hyper-local and hyper-queer. And so, we're very excited to attend a ton of community pride events from Woodstock to Kingston, and I've even signed up to volunteer to make some of them happen. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

That's really great and exciting, and it's really great that you and your wife have found a place that feels like home, and that you feel safe, and that you're able to celebrate this month. So, as I mentioned, that this is part two of our special series about queer educators. I do want to get a little bit of clarification from you before we go to the recording from SXSW EDU. One of the things that you talk about is your experience as a graduate student in North Carolina, and you mentioned HB2. Can you elaborate a little bit more about what HB2 was? 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah, absolutely. HB 2, or House Bill 2, was a bill passed in March, 2016 in North Carolina one week after I signed my confirmation to go to NC State for grad school. It was the first bill of its kind to limit bathroom occupancy to one sex assigned at birth, which forced transgender people to use a bathroom that does not align with their gender identity. 

At the time, it faced significant backlash. PayPal canceled plans to expand to Charlotte, which nixed 400 jobs. The 2017 NBA All-Star game was pulled out of the state. It ended up costing the state thousands of jobs and billions of dollars, and there was just total uproar. Unfortunately, a few years have passed, and these same bills are successfully being implemented across the U.S. with little uproar. In Florida, it's a crime for someone to use a bathroom that does not match [their] sex assigned at birth, and Utah set up a rather unsuccessful snitch line for their bathroom ban. It's disheartening to see how much that energy from just a few years back has lagged. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

Yeah, it really is. And I think what I do remember about that time in North Carolina, it was really the power of the business community speaking up and forcing the hand. And it has been interesting seeing over the last several years, this retrenchment in activity and pushback, and I think you and Phil touch on that in this conversation as well, and we'll get into that more. There is also some other things in this podcast episode that's different from some of our other episodes. And this one is that there are some audience questions, so thank you for bringing that, because that's new for the Horizons podcast series. Can you talk a little bit more about that? 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah. The audience questions were interesting because they were primarily from young queer teachers trying to navigate their future in this tumultuous landscape. And it was really heartening to hear their bravery as they pursue this important calling, despite the many headwinds against them. And I personally felt assured by the fact that queer people as always, will not stand down simply because of the systemic oppressions they face. That's not our history, and it certainly won't be our future. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

Let's get back to the stage. Here is JFF Taylor Sprague live at South by Southwest EDU, with DEI educator and activist Philip McAdoo. 

Taylor Sprague

Something that's so upsetting is when we talk about safety for children. And what I struggle with, I'm a non-binary trans person, and I have five nibblings, or for those who might not be aware of the word, it's like nieces and nephews in the gender-neutral word for that term. And I feel pretty confident and good that my and my partner's role in their lives is positive and important. And it's to say that hiding all signs of queerness is somehow safe for kids is such a slap in the face for all of us who love children and have children in our lives that we care about. What are some of the things that are behind these laws? How are people justifying it when it seems like it's such an obvious form of discrimination? How are we still moving so many of these laws forward? 

Philip McAdoo

Yeah, I think protection of children, that's the top of the list for me. They think they're doing these wonderful things by protecting children from folks who just happen to be pedophiles. And I'm just like, really? Because I mean, God forbid, I mean anyone, that's something that can happen regardless of your sexual identity and sexual orientation. But what scares me the most is just, again, the certainty in which people are just signing onto these laws or saying, "Yes, this is the right way." Or even how did someone's dignity in someone's right to exist get argued down to a bathroom? I never understood that at all in terms of one of the most popular ways that we entered into this conversation around trans rights was through the bathroom. And I was like, "What?" 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah. And I remember moving to, I made the great decision in 2015 that I was going to go to North Carolina for grad school. And they decided, I think probably right around this time March, and then a week later, HB 2 came out, which I feel like was the OG bathroom bill, but back then it was popular to be very vocal about not supporting these bathroom bills. 

Philip McAdoo

You need to tell the truth. Where in North Carolina did you go to school? 

Taylor Sprague

I went to NC State, which-

Philip McAdoo

I went to UNC. We don't even talk about them, but go ahead. But yeah, I mean, that's interesting, right? 

Taylor Sprague 

And I came out as non-binary as I made the decision. I had graduated, and I was like, "It is time for me to start living my life, lucky me that I'm going to move to North Carolina to do this." And it was a really, really hard two years, but at least at the time the NCAA was pulling out, conferences were pulling out, companies were talking about not going, there was such anger and resistance to this law, and it ultimately resulted in, shocking, money stops going to a place, the law changed. 

Philip McAdoo

But also, you're in an isolated space where you are on a college campus, which sometimes feels a little more open, but you're in Raleigh, one of the biggest cities in North Carolina, and the triangle there. So, there was a little bit of comfort there, but again, I hear you. 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah, still surprisingly challenging, but yes, Raleigh for sure. I think about now and how silent everyone feels. It feels like a lot of trans... Even we're at this conference, we're walking around and I'm seeing a lot of trans and queer people lead this really important conversation. And I'm also looking at companies not saying anything and people not standing up and not having this vocal response. And, of course, we have to give a little bit of credit to some of the positive outcomes that have come, which is a lot of these bills being struck down in courts, and there's some work happening. And I know I no longer feel the sense of confidence of things going to the Supreme Court that I once did. 

Philip McAdoo

Yeah, well, we got the drag bill, right? 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah, Tennessee. 

Philip McAdoo

That got put aside, and things are starting to, I'd even think yesterday or today they're starting to chip away at some of the stuff that's happening in Florida. There was pushback that said you can't delegate or relegate what happens inside corporate DEI spaces. So they are being allowed to do some work in terms of DEI. But even I'm on the board of a charter school for LGBTQ youth we're trying to start. So even the fact that there are lots of people thinking about spaces where we can educate queer people in a safe way, I think that's a positive sign as well. 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah, absolutely. And I'm thinking a lot about these states that have had sanctuary laws. And I've been thinking a lot about the economic ramifications of all this, and what does it mean for, when you have LGBTQ youth or individuals who are just— Want to be surrounded by LGBTQ youth and want to be environments where they're in a diverse space that are leaving the states that are against their identity. What does it mean when you see these individuals who are like, "I can't go to college here?" First of all, the lifelong individual impacts of, I grew up in a state like Florida or Virginia, where I have really great institutions.  

Taylor Sprague

A state like Florida or Virginia, where I have really great institutions, I have in-state tuition, but I have to make a decision to pay tens of thousands of more dollars and get in student debt and all of these things because I can't live in this state. And that in itself is this huge economic ramification that we're not talking about because we're always talking about, again, pronouns and bathrooms and things, and all of those things are important. And the long-term earning potential and wealth and generational wealth that is being thrust upon individuals in these circumstances is enormous. 

Philip McAdoo

I do find that there are queer people in corporate spaces, nonprofit spaces, who are still learning to navigate their way. And even as out as I was, there were still people who made assumptions about who I was. I remember I joined the executive leadership team of this organization, and during our executive leadership retreat, you can always tell when someone's going to say... Can I cuss on this? No. 

Taylor Sprague

I don't know, Justine.

Philip McAdoo

You can always say when somebody's going to say something fucked up because they look at you for a while, and they smile and smile. And so, for the longest time, she kept making eye contact with me, and I was like... And then finally she says to me, "I have a curiosity," red flag, number one. "I have a curiosity." I was like, "Oh okay." She said, "Don't get offended." I'm probably... I did, I was like, at this point I was just tired. I said, "I'm probably going to be offended." "No, no, no. I'm just curious about something." 

Taylor Sprague

They're always curious. 

Philip McAdoo

And I was like, "Okay." And she was like, "I know you're gay and all, and you're tall. Are you a drag queen?" 

Taylor Sprague

Oh my God. 

Philip McAdoo

And I was like, "First of all, you don't know me," inside I was like, "That's a huge compliment." But outside, I couldn't let her up. I was like, "What about me makes you think that I'm a drag queen? Because I'm gay? Because I'm tall?" Those types of assumptions that are we really safe here? And the fact that we are constantly having to cover and having to decide when it's safe to be out, when it's not to safe be out. And then on top of that, you have these laws. They're starting to impact that. 

Taylor Sprague

For folks who are all on a more progressive or inclusive side, are often debating. I think we were talking the other day about the practice of sharing pronouns in a group, and there's always that back and forth of, "You should do it, you should ask everyone to share their pronouns." And then there's always people who are like, "But you're going to out someone." 

And so, that always makes me question, at what point have queer people not demonstrated that we will protect ourselves as we need to. We will protect each other. We will know, as you mentioned with this individual. I know when I am not sharing my pronouns, I know when I'm deciding that I'm a cis man in this conversation because it's not safe for me to come out. And we have been so, and this is the case of many marginalized communities. We are responsible for each other and for ourselves and to protect, and we will make decisions as we need to survive in them. 

Philip McAdoo

Yeah, you and I talked a little bit about this but I just did a workshop last week, and I was like, "We're going to say our pronouns." And they were like, "No, no, no, we're not going to do that because..." I was like, "Oh, yeah." And so there was some issues about safety because there were people, for those of you who don't know, some people may be out in certain situations, but by sharing their pronouns, all of a sudden they may have to ask or people question, "Why did you say they in there?" So, those types of things were starting to happen. So, there is a little bit of a pivot on that. But again, to your point, okay, just meet people where they are. 

Taylor Sprague

I'm curious, as we think about, we've talked about a lot of things are impacting the ability of queer teachers to be themselves first and foremost, and also be teachers. And we know that teachers are not in abundance these days. And I'm thinking about what are some of the solutions to this snowballing problem. I know it's complex and it's not simple, but what can we do about all of this? 

Philip McAdoo

The one thing that comes to mind is just really looking for an environment. People have, upfront in the job interview process, just come out and say, "This is who I am." And be really clear about the expectations of how you show up in the context of that school community so that people have an understanding of what you will be bringing to the environment. But again, it sounds like, "Oh, just come out and just-" But it sounds difficult when you really, really, really, really need the job and you're still second-guessing, "Am I going to be safe here?" 

We talk a lot about allyship. I go up and down with... I don't know, because sometimes, being an ally, people think that I'm okay, I'm just an ally. You're the one with the problem. No, we all got stuff we need to work on. So, I go back and forth, but really, till we find a better word. Being an ally to queer people, really advocating for us in those spaces. And the more and more that we see ourselves in leadership positions, I think we start to get a little more comfortable in terms of how we need to show up. So, I think it's really tricky right now to get a sense of what our path forward is. 

Taylor Sprague

And I am thinking a lot about that conversation around allyship. I think we can underestimate for... First of all, the importance of having these conversations and being part of these conversations and bringing it up again. I think one of the biggest challenges of now versus 2016, 2015 is silence is much more abundant these days. And part of it's that we're all, I know I'm exhausted. I don't know how you all are doing, but since the pandemic and the civil rights moment after George Floyd, and we're talking a lot more about racial equity, and then we're watching that energy wane and there's just so many cycles of just intense experiences happening. 

One thing I'm thinking a lot around with allyship, how often are people going back and saying, "Oh, men and women are saying," or assuming someone's pronouns, or doing these things where we reinforce the binary and assumed lived experience of people because that is the default system that's been built. And an allyship being that next level of not just we're talking about gender, and so I can talk about it in this way because I'm aware and really thinking about it right now, but day to day, how are you helping build an environment that normalizes the sense that none of us know who anyone's partner is or what anyone's gender is or experience with the world is? 

Philip McAdoo

Right. That's such an interesting point. And I think now we're seeing this big anti-DEI machine. Anti-queer machine, and it makes me think if we went too far, and I'm just speaking in draft here, but there's a sense of a lot of the work that we did initially as a DEI practitioner and those of us who care about this work, it was on expecting individuals to change. Like, you're homophobic, you're racist, this is what you need to do. And so people would go into these spaces like, "I don't wanna, I don’t feel-" or "You misgendered me," or "You know my pronouns, so you're a bad person." 

And so there was that whole force where, how do I even enter into this conversation? Whereas now where I think the shift should be is around systems. What's the collaborative approach that we all can come together in this room and say, "Where are the inequities in this system that are causing people to not feel fully seen or valued or cared for? And what is our collective approach? What are you seeing from your vantage point? What are you seeing from your vantage point." As opposed to, we're going to talk about how all white people are racist. 

So, instead of this individual approach expecting people to change, how can we create a more collaborative approach where we all can say, "From my vantage point, this is what this looks like." And then we can start to get to the individual behavior. Oh, by the way, you need to get the hell out of here because you are X, Y, and Z. And that way we can draw more people in. So, that's where I think we need to shift. And we talked about this a little bit in our prep, but do you feel like that maybe we went too far? I know there was a lot of, again, alot of work that I was leading early on was around people canceling people and people feeling like, "Oh, I feel like I can't engage because if I say something or do something, then I'm out of here." People potentially lose their job. So, a part of me almost feels like, did we go too far and how do we reframe this whole conversation? 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah, I think a lot about that. My partner [and I] actually have this conversation a lot, she tends to be a lot more forgiving of a person as far as cancel culture goes. And over the past few years has really challenged me because I feel like a few years ago I was a part of that. It was so easy to be like, "If you care about social justice, you must hate anyone who says the wrong thing or does the wrong thing." And so often, that ends up being energy we point towards people who are on our side and agree with us, but they said the wrong word, as opposed to the people who are actively working against us. And I've been reflecting a lot over the past few years around the role of shame in cancel culture and that it's not a helpful emotion. Shame does not typically enable people or empower people to make decisions and do things that are effective. It silences people, it makes people bitter and turn away from environments. And how can we inject more love and grace and support for one another and collaboration and community? And also to recognize that we're all fighting because we're all being harmed by this system. 

And so if we're constantly having to then fight towards each other and go back and be like, "I have to be perfect for this space." We're not getting anywhere. How do you create a space that you can have real conversations so that we can talk about what's actually happening? Because what's actually happening is people are losing their jobs, people are losing access to education, and people are being forced out of communities they've lived in forever if they have the means to leave those communities because of these laws. And that isn't the group of people trying to figure out activating together. That's a power that is continuing to do their work because we're so busy telling each other we said the wrong thing and not thinking about how we can act upwards. 

Philip McAdoo

Yeah, I like that. I got nothing to say. You did that good. 

Taylor Sprague

Oh, thank you. I appreciate it. 

Philip McAdoo

You're welcome. I approve. 

Taylor Sprague

I'm looking at time, and I know that there's a lot of folks in here with a lot of perspectives I'm sure on this. And curious if we want to turn it to the audience, if there's anyone with questions, perspectives. 

Philip McAdoo 

Sure, sure. 

[Audience member asks a question]  

Taylor Sprague

Awesome. I'm going to repeat the question real quick. So as a future teacher, what advice might you give for teachers coming into the field? 

Philip McAdoo

Yeah, I really do think as much as you can when you're looking for a school community, just to be really upfront about who you are and your expectations. When I did that, I felt so much freer. I remember being in an interview, and they were like, "Well, why are you coming here?" And I'm sure it was not as long as it was in my head, but I was like, "You have to tell them that you're gay. You have to tell them that your partner's moving here. You have to tell them that that's why you're moving." So I had that, and I was like, "I can't." Then I was like, "Wait, it's for diversity." And I was like, "My partner is moving here." And you could see the room shift, and it was like one lady who looked confused and I got that job and someone pulled me aside who was on the panel, and they said, "I loved when you came out to them because there were people whose heads were spinning. Did you say partner? Did you say husband?" 

But I think you just have to test that upfront so that you know immediately if they're going to be able to support you, if they're going to be able to give you what you need. And then I had some wonderful teachers share me their techniques. And one woman, she was a chemistry teacher, says, "I'm a chemistry teacher, but for the first week, I come out to my students, we talk about community, we talk about how we support one another, and the result is they feel safe, they feel supported. They know that I'm a champion for them." So, I think we really have to start stepping into these spaces, just really talking upfront about who we are and the expectations that we have in terms of what we need from the communities. 

Taylor Sprague

And I'll add to that, I was never a teacher in K-12 environment, but I was in higher education earlier in my career. And when I was in grad school, as I mentioned, I went to North Carolina, came out as nonbinary, and I was certainly not the first nonbinary student that NC State had ever seen. But in the department I was working in was, and I was working for housing and residence life, and of course North Carolina, the bathroom bills had come out. One of the things I noticed was I worked in a building that had single use men's bathroom and a single use women's bathroom. And I was like, "Can we change this?" And they were kind of like, "No, because the state and the laws." And I did the work. I met with the university architect. I tried to understand building codes and I brought it to someone. 

I made it so easy for someone to do their job and just say, "Sure, I'll order this." And that took allyship from a bunch of people. There was this person who worked for the university architect who did all the work, explained all of the information, and was like, "The architect will pay for this if it just gets approved." And then there was the person who was willing to listen and at least sit down and have that first conversation. And I think sometimes we have to do some of that work and we have to do the legwork, but often we have to remember that no one before us has probably been doing that. And that resulted in every single one of the single-use restrooms in housing and residence life at NC State changing. And it was surprisingly simple. The right things lined up. And I think sometimes we have to get out of the idea that someone else has said something or someone else has done something. 

And if we see something, try not to keep complaining about it, figure out what we can do about it and where we can act our influence. And many schools and leaders have a lot to worry about. And when someone tells them, "Don't do this thing because you're going to lose funding or fining or whatever." They're going to avoid anything possible to get under fire for that. So if you can be the person making that person's life a little bit easier and helping navigate those things and asking the questions that maybe haven't been asked, I think you'd be surprised by what change you can make in your own community because no one else has been asking it. And a lot of allies will say, "Yeah, I noticed that and didn't like that." But they won't do things. So we have to be the people who step up and do it and ask those questions. 

Audience Member

I'm actually from India, but I worked in Japan for the last 10 years, and we've started doing the opposite of what you're doing. We started teaching LGBTQ in the classes in K-12. So, we deliver 21st century skills, but some of the guided speakers are LGBTQ+. And please pardon me, I don't know the terminology. And now it's plus-plus. And we do have a drag queen session from Thailand, by the way, and we bring it to the students and they never comment about those sessions because the theme is not about identity. 

The theme is about how do you change the world, who you are. So they see individuals who have faced challenges because it's very challenging being LGBTQ+ and any part of the world, even in the United States, which I think is the most acceptable of most of the countries. So our experiences, when we bring it to the teenagers, they have a lot of empathy build up, and then they can identify that empathy with LGBTQ+. And we have yet to see teachers come out now that the empathy's there. So when that does happen, I let you know. But it's very interesting to know that's happening the opposite in the U.S. 

Philip McAdoo

Yeah. And you said you're in Japan? You're teaching in Japan? 

Audience Member

Yes. 

Philip McAdoo

What city?

Audience Member

We have a platform that delivers the content to 60,000 students in Japan. So we work with 350 schools in multiple cities, but mostly in Tokyo and Osaka. 

Philip McAdoo

That's great. That's really great. 

Taylor Sprague

I appreciate you sharing that because I think something that also, y’know. Again, and this goes back a little bit to the protecting kids' conversation, is that often kids are totally fine. Kids are good. They're like, "Your gender's blue. Okay, awesome. You want to play soccer?" They don't care. 

Philip McAdoo

Yeah. You got a question here. 

Audience Member 2

Hi . 

Philip McAdoo

Hi. 

Audience Member 2

I wanted to talk a little bit about gender roles in schools and those institutions. So, I'm also teacher in training, and last week I started doing observations at a public high school in Brooklyn. And the assistant principal was taking me and the other grad student around the school and the assistant principal, when he was often leading the way, he would open the door for us and hold it and wait, and then we would go. And then there was one time where I was leading, and so I opened the door and I stepped to the side and he- 

Taylor Sprague

Does not compute. 

Audience Member 2

Yeah. And he really hesitated. And then, even now, I'm worried that I offended him. And I don't know, maybe it's just a traditional kind of thing. So I'm wondering what y'all think about that, like gender roles. 

Taylor Sprague

I think one thing I think about a lot with this issue is that the more and more we try to police gender, the more we continue to reinforce and harm every single person who has a gendered experience with the world, which is every person. I think the other thing that has helped me manage some of those, like, "Oh, this is so uncomfortable," has been I recognize that I don't have to hold other people's stuff. And the most powerful thing a therapist ever said to me when I was struggling with something about being some queer person was, that's not... We built everything else. Every other environment and structure has been built by humans and reinforced by humans, and you are not the wrong thing. The society we built is wrong. The bathroom's wrong, the sign's wrong. You as a person showing up in the way you showed up, you opening that door, you doing that thing, you using these pronouns is not the thing that is wrong. 

And I think that was such a huge unlock for me because it gave me moments where if someone has a moment of discomfort or when I'm afraid to share my pronouns in a space, I just have to remember that. Of course, safety is always the thing I'm accounting for, but when that opportunity comes, it is not on me how that person reacts. And that is something that they can go process with their therapist or whoever they talk to. 

And that has liberated me in ways that I can't even describe. And so I think the more those reactions happen or those incidents happen, just saying, "That is not my problem." And the point you get to give yourself is showing up as yourself that day, I think that can't be understated and has been one of the most powerful things for me. 

We're at just about at the end of our time, so I want to, I think with one minute left, ask you what gives you hope? 

Philip McAdoo

What gives me hope? I don't know, having conversations like this, one of the reasons why I wanted to teach a university is I wanted to have regular and ongoing conversations with young people. They give me hope. 

This young queer generation, they really give me hope. I think there's so much that we can learn from them just in terms, "I would never get my nails painted," I'm like, "That's what they're doing now." So I'm really, really, really learning from them. 

And just too being able to have these conversations with you. I feel like we met a year ago, and I feel really close to you and I feel like I'm learning a lot from you. And congratulations, you just got a promotion, that you are a director when we started this. 

Taylor Sprague

Thank you. Thank you. 

Philip McAdoo

But yeah, being asked to hold this space with you, that gives me hope as well. So thank you. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

I'm back in the studio with our special guest host JFF Director of Strategy, Taylor Sprague. 

So, Taylor, one of the things that you brought up is the way all the backlash really is creating a distraction and a level of safety and risk for people to show up in their full identity. And that what's happened over time is that people feel ashamed that they might say the wrong pronoun or the wrong word and that we need to allow people to make mistakes, but that we also need to have some level of action to ensure that we're doing the work to create places of safety for queer people to live and to thrive. 

And so with that, as we think about both JFF's North Star and the North Star that you brought up in the first episode, what do you think should be the North Star for our workplaces and our institutions to create safe spaces for queer people, for BIPOC people, and basically for anyone who is considered other, to work and to thrive? 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah. I think that we need to be working towards workplaces in which people can contribute fully, access the same level of security for themselves and their dependents as anyone else, and work toward their ambitions without worrying that being who they are will hold them back. 

We can all create a place where everyone thrives, and I think the first step is to recognize that it's a goal we should be striving for. My hope is that after hearing these two episodes, folks are a little bit closer to that goal. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

Yeah, I hope so too. It's not just about the environments that people create to make folks feel safe, but what else we are doing to counter what we're seeing in terms of the backlash legislatively that really does threaten the safety of queer adults, of queer children, of queer young people. 

What would you want the call to action to be for our listeners? And recognizing that even though we're airing this episode during Pride Month, that action does not only have to happen during Pride Month? 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah, I think first and foremost, following the news, I'm always shocked when I talk to people about this, and they have no idea what's going on. And so getting plugged into what's going on, contacting policymakers in your state, especially if you're in a state that is being very active and building these anti-LGBTQ laws, and getting involved at the local level. There is so much happening in terms of school boards and communities and towns, and I think this is definitely one of those moments where you can make a huge difference by being involved in your community and creating a more inclusive environment for everyone who lives there. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

I agree 100%. Thank you, Taylor. And thanks again to Philip McAdoo for opening up this dialogue, and also for the audience members who really helped to broaden the perspective. 

Taylor Sprague

Yeah. Thank you so much to Tameshia again, and thank you to South by Southwest EDU for offering us this platform for this important conversation. 

Tameshia Bridges Mansfield

And thank you to our listeners for joining us in this episode of the Horizons podcast. Please let us know what you thought about today's conversation by sharing a comment wherever you find your podcasts. 

And get ready for the Horizons summit, July 22 and 23 in Washington, DC. Registration is open at horizons.jff.org. I look forward to the conversation next time. 

For now, I'm your host, Tameshia Bridges Mansfield.

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