Almost 200 non secular schools deemed ‘unsafe’ for LGBTQ college students by Campus Pleasure
(RNS) — Dozens of spiritual universities throughout the nation, together with Seattle Pacific College in Washington and Brigham Younger College in Utah, have been listed as unsafe and discriminatory campuses for LGBTQ college students by Campus Pleasure, a nationwide group advocating for inclusive schools and universities.
Fewer than 10 of the 193 colleges on the record launched Thursday (Sept. 8), weren’t religiously affiliated or didn’t record a non secular affiliation, in keeping with Campus Pleasure.
Campus Pleasure, which started in 2002 as a web-based group and have become a nonprofit in 2006, stated it launched the nationwide itemizing in 2015 to convey consideration to high schools and universities that requested Title IX exemptions in opposition to LGBTQ college students.
Among the many campuses that made “The Worst List:” Azusa Pacific College, an interdenominational Christian faculty in Southern California; Baylor College, a Baptist faculty in Waco, Texas; George Fox College, a Quaker establishment in Newberg, Oregon; Yeshiva College, a Fashionable Orthodox Jewish faculty in New York Metropolis; and Liberty College, a Baptist establishment in Lynchburg, Virginia.
RELATED: Are LGBTQ students at Christian schools discriminated against? A lawsuit, scholarly studies say yes.
Lots of the colleges made the record for claiming an exemption to Title IX and for “permitting the faculty to discriminate in opposition to its college students on the premise of sexual orientation, gender id, marital standing, being pregnant or receipt of abortion whereas nonetheless receiving federal funds.” Greater than 120 colleges have been listed as exempt from Title IX.
Different colleges in California certified for the record because of their opposition to a state invoice that targets non-public universities exempted from anti-discrimination legal guidelines. The faculties argue compliance would battle with their non secular tenets, the Los Angeles Times reported.
“Campus Pleasure envisions campuses and a society freed from anti-LGBTQ+ prejudice, bigotry, and hate,” Shane Windmeyer , govt director of Campus Pleasure, stated in a statement on Twitter. “The rising anti-LGBTQ+ assaults on youth throughout the nation makes the discharge of #TheWorstList much more essential and well timed.”
The record is printed as colleges like Seattle Pacific College have confronted backlash from college students protesting insurance policies they are saying are discriminatory towards LGBTQ folks.
RELATED: Washington state confirms probe into Seattle Pacific University’s LGBTQ hiring practices
Washington Lawyer Common Bob Ferguson in late July confirmed his workplace was investigating SPU for potential unlawful discrimination in opposition to LGBTQ folks as a result of faculty’s employment insurance policies. The investigation got here as college students staged a monthlong sit-in to protest the board of trustees’ determination to maintain a coverage barring the hiring of LGBTQ folks.
“Till college students can see themselves represented of their professors, SPU can’t be thought of a secure house for LGBTQ+ college students,” an Instagram statement from Seattle Pacific LGBTQ+ Protest stated.