Nativity and Citizenship Status and School Experiences of LGBTQ Students in the United States

• In Event: Policy and pedagogy and SOGIE issues in education

Proposal

Increasing anti-immigrant rhetoric and governmental actions illustrate the complex environment negotiated by LGBTQ immigrants in the United States. Research has explored how the intersection of sexual orientation, gender, race, and other identities manifest in unique experiences across the LGBTQ population and there has been some scholarship exploring how nativity and citizenship status, which serve as markers of cultural legitimacy, function in the lives of some LGBTQ youth (Enriquez & Saguy, 2016; Hazeldean & Singla, 2002; Terriquez, 2015). For LGBTQ youth, who already routinely experience negative classroom environments, these characteristics may contribute further to marginalization. Students from immigrant families may often encounter barriers to their academic success, including attending schools that are under-resourced with greater issues of safety, in general (APA, 2012). For lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer students (LGBTQ), being an immigrant or a non-native English speaker may further highlight “difference” in ways that U.S.-born students may not experience, perhaps making them greater risk for negative school experiences related to their LGBTQ status as well. Although commonalities exist across the LGBTQ student population with regard to their school experiences, such as having safety concerns related to their sexual orientation and/or how they express their gender, it is important to understand that experiences are shaped and may vary by students’ personal characteristics, as with race or ethnicity (Elze, 2003; McCready, 2001; Park, 2001).

Purpose

To date there has been little examination of nativity status and immigration among LGBTQ students. In order to widen our lens of understanding of the experiences of LGBTQ students in the U.S., we must address the diversities in our schools, including these specific characteristics. Further, scholar activists and educators serving to improve the educational experiences of LGBTQ students may be unprepared to address the multiple intersecting identities of these students. This paper serves to examine the role nativity status, immigration status, and native language status may have in contributing to hostile school climate experiences for LGTQ secondary school students currently.

Method and Data Sources

Data came from the most recent wave of a national biennial survey of secondary school students who identified as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and/or queer (LGBTQ) (N=23,001). The sample included 3.1% of respondents who said they were born outside the United States and its territories, which is slightly smaller than a national estimate from 2014 showing 3.8% of students in K-12 schools were born outside of the U.S. (Child Trends, 2014). The majority of immigrant students were U.S. citizens (62.9%). Just over a quarter (27.7%) of the immigrant students were lawfully present non-citizens, and less than a tenth (9.4%) reported that they were unauthorized U.S. residents. Immigrant students from Europe and the Asia and Pacific regions were more likely to be U.S. citizens, and students from the Latin America and the Middle East regions were more likely to be unauthorized than immigrant students from other regions. About two-thirds of non-U.S. born respondents (64.9%) said they had a native or primary language other than English.

In this paper, we specifically examined experiences of LGBTQ youth in school vis-à-vis nativity status (U.S.-born vs. non-U.S.-born), citizenship status (U.S. citizen vs. lawfully present non-citizen vs. unauthorized non-citizen), and native language (English vs. other languages) on the following school indicators: 1) feelings of safety at school, 2) victimization due to sexual orientation, 2) victimization due to gender expression, 3) victimization due to race/ethnicity, and 4) relationship to school.

Results

Overall, 16.0% of all LGBTQ foreign-born students in the survey felt unsafe because of their citizenship status. Those who were unauthorized immigrants were more likely to feel unsafe because of citizenship than those who were lawfully present non-citizens or citizens - 47.0% vs. 28.2% and 6.3%, respectively. For more than a third of the foreign-born LGBTQ students in the survey (35.1%), English was not one of their native languages, and 12.2% of all foreign-born students felt unsafe because of their level of English language proficiency. Not surprisingly, foreign-born students for whom English was not a native language were more likely to feel unsafe for this reason than foreign-born students whose native languages include English (29.4% vs. 3.2%).

Foreign-born LGBTQ students did not differ from U.S.-born students on experiences of victimization based on sexual orientation or gender expression. However, foreign-born LGBTQ students were more likely to experience bullying or harassment based on their actual or perceived race or ethnicity than their peers. Even though immigrant students were more likely to identify as people of color than other students, these differences in victimization based on race/ethnicity remained significant even after accounting for the racial/ethnic composition of the sample. In addition, there were no significant differences in race/ethnicity-based victimization among foreign-born students with regard to their citizenship status.

In that foreign-born LGBTQ students experienced greater victimization because of race and were more likely to feel unsafe because of nativity status or English language proficiency, we examined whether these youth differed from their LGBTQ peers in their relationship to school. Our findings suggest that, on most indicators, foreign-born LGBTQ students may have a qualitatively better relationship with their school and their education than U.S.-born LGBTQ students.

Our findings show, overall, that immigrant LGBTQ students have similar experiences to their non-immigrant LGBTQ peers at school with regard to their LGBTQ status, but they then have added safety concerns related to their immigrant status, their citizenship status, and English language proficiency. Yet LGBTQ immigrant students appeared to have more positive connections to their education than their peers. Thus, more research is needed to further understand the experiences of this population. At a time in the U.S. where anti-immigrant rhetoric may be increasingly more normative, through our government, media and public opinion, it is even more important to be cognizant of the ways in which LGBTQ students’ school experiences, and their ability to safely attend and succeed in school may be affected by immigrant and citizenship status.

Author

• Joseph Kosciw, GLSEN