ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the role education plays in establishing, reinforcing, questioning, and dismantling school environments that marginalize Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning (LGBTQ)+ and gender expansive students. It examines how the various levels of schools regard and behave toward LGBTQ+ identities through childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood. The chapter presents models of LGBTQ+ student development throughout the educational process and the heteronormative nature of schooling. It employs the word "queer," which refers to varying genders and sexualities and attempts to capture the possible social practices, behaviors, communities, and beliefs associated with this range. While the experiences of LGBTQ+ college and university students can resemble those of K-12 students, colleges, and universities have also laid the foundation for supporting LGBTQ+ people and building support through activism. Studying the process to recognize same-sex marriage under the fourteenth amendment of the US Constitution is just one example of several ways history can reflect LGBTQ+ experiences.
