Gay student safety fear
November 03, 2006 11:00pm
KEITH Phillips once told his teacher he would die for the right "to be himself".
The Year 10 Alexandra Hills State High School student is openly gay and says Year 12 students have bullied and taunted him with verbal abuse.Yesterday Keith, 15, missed school because of a warning of possible violence.
Keith's mother Trudy Lillicrap said the school had called her on Thursday night asking her to ensure Keith took the next day off because the school had received information his safety was under threat from a group of Year 12 students.
Although unsure if he would return to school, Keith said he was willing to face the situation. "I'm not going to sit at home and hide . . ." he said. Ms Lillicrap said that she was worried the boys would not face any consequences because it was the end of the school year.
"I'm really glad they (the school) rang me . . . but . . . there was nothing done," Ms Lillicrap said.
She said the school simply told her it was watching a handful of students and feared what would happen if Keith appeared at school."
So, the school sends the gay kid home, but does nothing to the homophobic young thugs threatening him with violence? How fucked is that?!
6 comments:
That is just so fucked up. The school surely has a duty of care to uphold and telling the boys mother to not send him to school is in no way upholding that duty of care. What a fucking cop out! They should have told the year 12 boys parents that they were not to come to school. And as for not being able to do anything about it because the boys were leaving school...the police, duh.
Angry.
on another note lovely to see you on friday.
x
I thought that the events of the last two weeks out in Werribee would have made the teachers stand up and put a stop to it all. Standing back and watching
Good on Keith for being so brave. I used to stay home because I didnt read a book that I had to do an "oral" speech on. lets all go Alexandra Hills and pretend to be students so we can protect him. Someone needs to!
I should finish that sentance... Standing back and watching achieves nothing except seeing a boy get beaten up.
Thanks Guys.
I’m only just finding all of these articles re-posted now. I got through school and am now a successful IT professional. I enjoy my job and love my partner of two years.
Great to hear Keith - thanks for letting me know!
Thank you Richard for sharing this story... hopefully we can educate more people with people like you helping out....
Keiths mum xo
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