Read This, Save Lives: A Teacher’s Guide to Creating Safer Classrooms for LGBTQ+ Students

by Sameer Jha

Read This, Save Lives has been written by 16 year old Sameer Jha to help teachers create classrooms and schools where gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer students can thrive. This book has deep personal relevance for Sameer, because he was severely bullied for being different in elementary and middle school. As he grew older, he learned more about his own identity and came out as queer and trans. He found acceptance, as well as a new to put an end to anti-LGBTQ+ bullying in schools.

Today, Sameer has become an activist, an educator, and the founder of a non-profit called The Empathy Alliance. He is a Congressional Silver Medal recipient, has been named one of the top 10 trans youth activists in America, and has reached over 1 million people with his message promoting LGBTQ+ student safety. This book tells the story of Sameer’s journey, using specific incidents to illustrate important lessons about LGBTQ+ youth needs and how to meet them.

Find more than a 100 actionable tips created with busy, resource constrained teachers in mind. An entire chapter is devoted to an extraordinary teacher who has transformed her own school using many of the same principles included in this guide. Read This, Save Lives is brimming with expert quotes, sobering statistics, cutting edge research, critical terminology, real world case studies, and resources from some of the best LGBTQ+ rights organizations in the country. Get ready to be inspired by one of the few books on the topic of LGBTQ+ youth safety that has actually been written by an LGBTQ+ youth!

Genres: LGBT

132 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 9, 2018

Reviews

[Dan Allbery · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a motivated, happy, energetic theatre kid who loved ancient history and geeked out about physics. They did not see the immense pain and sadness I was hiding. So much of my energy was spent trying to fit in: I was always monitoring and self-policing how I walked and talked, what I wore, and what I shared with others. Still, something would always give me away and attract hurtful remarks like “Dude, thats so gay!” from people I thought were my friends.

In my continued journey as a gay teacher and GSA advisor, I continue to find and read sources to help me better support my middle school students. Right now I am in the stage of “read everything” and that is working for me; however, I feel this text wasn’t a fit for me. This book is great for “beginner allies”—those who may need foundational information. For me, I preferred Pride and Progress by Brett and Brassington more. Regardless, all resources have value and if you invest the time in reading this resource, you will walk away with a better understanding of how to support the LGBTQ+ community.

[Corby · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quick read. For those that know what OWL is: the beginning chapters of the book are basically a primer of the 7th grade OWL course for mainstream classroom teachers. I knew quite a bit of the author's story, having been part of the FUSD community and having seen the author speak at board meetings. There are some solid recommendations here for small supportive things that can be done in the classroom, and encouragement for building GSAs where they may not already exist. This could be a 5 star read for a novice in the world of LGBTQ+ adolescence, but even though a teacher I don't feel like I'm the target audience here. I would have liked the author to focus more on how to address those segments of the community that actively oppose GSA formation, the new health curriculum we were all trying to support, etc. As a teacher, suggestions for dealing with the biases and discrimination from parents that are part of that community would perhaps have interested me more.

[JTGlow · Rating 2 out of 5]

Got this one at work and there’s nothing new here, possibly because it’s been a few years since it was published and possibly because a lot of it should be common sense, especially if you teach in a reasonable/liberal state.
There is such a glaring mistake on page 67, that it should be rectified and calls into question the scholarship of the author and the need for fact checkers.
He lists 12 people to include in your curriculum and asks that you point out their accomplishments. James Baldwin is the fifth listed. Then he writes, …”Did you notice that people of color are missing completely from the list above? I didn’t until someone pointed it out to me!”
Yikes. So other people read this and were equally ignorant? How did this get past everyone?

[Angie Powers · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you haven't been to training on this topic, this is a 5-star read for sure!

[Tricia Friedman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very quick read-a good book to recommend as an introductory text for Teachers just starting to think about why inclusivity matters.