N.S. poised to change guidance for teachers on supporting gender-diverse students

Koma White is not afraid to show who they are.

White, 17, is a student at Citadel High School in Halifax. They're non-binary and dress "outside the norm," as they describe it, mixing clothing styles to reflect the mix of male and female attributes they feel inside.  

For the most part, White said they feel accepted by their teachers and classmates. But not by everyone.

"When you get spotted dressing like me, you do get barked at sometimes," said White.

Being barked at like a dog is an increasingly common form of verbal abuse, often directed at LGBTQ people.

Teachers and administrators in Nova Scotia are supposed to follow a set of guidelines to support students who, like White, are trans and non-binary, and protect them from discrimination. 

White said those guidelines, released in 2014, have holes and lack clarity. The result, they said, is that LGBTQ students often don't bother reporting conflicts or abuse, because they don't have faith there will be a resolution.

White is part of a chorus of Nova Scotians, which includes advocates, health-care professionals and parents, who are calling on the government to update the guidelines.

CBC News obtained documents through access-to-information laws that show the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development is planning to update the decade-old guidance. But after a year of work, the changes have not been released and it's unclear when they will be.

Alec Stratford, executive director of the Nova Scotia College of Social Workers, said the current guidelines are no longer useful because of social, political and legislative changes that have happened over the past 10 years. 

"We have new human rights laws, we have laws banning conversion therapy, we also are seeing heightened political rhetoric towards LGBTQSIA groups and youth in particular, all which warrant a stronger response to uphold and protect the rights of the most vulnerable in our society," Stratford said in an interview.

The college of social workers was part of an inter-professional group that wrote an open letter to Nova Scotia's minister of education earlier this year, calling for immediate changes to the guidelines to reflect the new context.

Following several months of correspondence with the department, Stratford and a few other people who signed the letter recently met with department staff.

Stratford said he took away from the meeting that there is "a sense of urgency" at the department to update the guidelines, although he wasn't told where that process stands. Stratford is hoping for some immediate changes to address violence toward LGBTQ students, and for the whole set of guidelines to be updated within a year.