RACE, SEXUALITY AND SCHOOLS: A QUANTITATIVE ASSESSMENT OF INTERSECTIONALITY.

Many studies focus on the social problems of adolescents with same-sex attraction. Several variables have been found that impede their academic achievement for a variety of reasons, including poor attendance, physical or verbal harassment by students or teachers, and dropout. Little attention has been paid to non-heterosexual sexual attraction or behavior as a source of resilience and motivation for academic achievement. Situated in research about the "achievement gap" or "opportunity gap" between Black and White students and current research on the social and academic atmosphere in schools for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning students, this study analyzed data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health Wave I dataset. This study found that among students who do not have same-gender sexual attractions, race was a significant factor in predicting a decrease in positive school attitudes. However, among students with a same-gender sexual attraction, race ceases to be a factor in predicting positive school attitudes. For Black students, same-gender attraction may function as a protective factor against negative educational expectations.