Find That One Person Who Cares

The year was 1973.

The class was ninth-grade biology.

The topic was a fleeting 15 minutes of sex education.

At least one student in that class, Jeff Perrotti, was feeling very much alone.

So the 14-year-old made a deal with the man he hoped to be one day:

Don't forget this feeling. You know you're gay, and you know how you're feeling right now. If and when you get older, you will talk to kids so they will know they're not alone.

More than three decades later, Perrotti, who teaches psychology at Harvard, has kept that promise to his teenage self. He is the founding director of the Massachusetts Department of Education's Safe Schools Program for Gay and Lesbian Students, and he runs workshops about gender and sexual orientation for school districts across the country.

At 50, Jeff Perrotti is also a grateful former student of Catholic schools, including Gilmour Academy, that made it easier to be a gay kid growing up in small-town Chesterland, Ohio.

He exudes a youthful enthusiasm as he describes the nuns who looked out for him as a gregarious but awkward boy, including Sister Nicole, who arranged one day to have a school athlete teach him how to throw a football. He laughs when he recalls his seventh-grade teacher, Mrs. Katzenstein: "I can still hear her voice in my head saying, 'You're one of the smartest students I've taught.'"

School was never perfect, he said. "I have to be honest; it wasn't all positive. I felt alone and invisible because I couldn't express myself. But I always had caring adults who looked out for me. It only takes one to make a tremendous difference in a kid's life."

Perrotti said most kids who are gay know it by age 10 but typically wait until 16 to tell anyone. Parents often struggle with such news, and peers can be brutal, which recent high-profile teen suicides have painfully illustrated. Perrotti said there's a lot schools can do to help support potential victims of bullying. He also knows that schools are often reluctant to own the problem.

"When I first approach a school district, people sometimes tell me, 'The principal doesn't want this.' 'The superintendent doesn't want this.' Some principals will tell me, 'I am not touching this issue until parents and students make me.' But there's always someone who does want to help LGBT students, and that person can make it happen.

As a wise nurse from Minnesota once told me, 'there's always a person who cares. Find that person.'"

Perrotti has seen great progress, especially when straight students step up to lead. Such allies are crucial in creating an environment of acceptance for LGBT students. Otherwise, they often live in silent desperation and fear.

"When I was in middle school, I always found support, but I also always knew my sexuality had to remain a secret," he said. "Secrecy makes your world smaller. You walk around thinking you deserve less in life, that you are supposed to settle for 'just a little bit.' That's why it's important to see visible signs of support. That's how you challenge negative stereotypes so that young people know they're not alone."

It's not easy for most people — at any age — to take a public stand on behalf of others, particularly those targeted by a vocal minority. Perrotti often uses stories from people in the community he visits to coax out others' courage.

"Seeing ourselves in others emboldens us. So if I'm working with a room full of teachers, I'll ask, 'How many of you have said something when you hear someone say, "That's so gay"?'"

A few hands shoot up, and the stories tumble out:

"My best friend is a lesbian."

"I tell students we don't use hurtful language like that."

"Whenever I hear that, I think of my favorite uncle."

Typically, the discomfort in the room begins to evaporate, making room for encouraging candor.

"People will surprise you," he said.

People like his mother.

"I came out to my parents in 1980," Perrotti said. "My mom said, 'But, Jeff, there are no gay people in Cleveland.'"

Lillian Perrotti said she was worried for her son's future. "I was so afraid of what it would mean for his life," she said. "I was afraid he'd be so alone, so unhappy."

Not so, 30 years later.

"Now she tells me everyone's gay," her son said, laughing.

"I can't help it," she told me. "Whenever I meet someone who's as warm and kind as Jeff, I assume he's gay."

Connie Schultz is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and an essayist for Parade magazine. To find out more about Connie Schultz (cschultz@plaind.com) and read her past columns, please visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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