Julio Flores, Program Director for the Alliance, spoke recently with Alec Karam at the Windy City Times. Flores expressed his thoughts and suggestions for what we can do to support the young people in our schools in light of new executive orders. Here’s a brief excerpt from the article published on February 17, 2025:

I recently connected with an educator in central Illinois who has three trans students, and we had a really good conversation. And one of the things that he mentioned was, ‘I’m trying to support my students as much as possible and their parents as much as possible, but we just don’t have answers, and it feels like no one is advocating for me,’ Flores shared, pointing to the work of the Alliance and other programs to help provide guidelines to educators across the state.

He also called for adult allies who aren’t in school settings to participate in school board meetings to provide a pro-LGBTQ voice and even run for seats to ensure queer bigotry is not given a larger seat at the table.

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Learn more here about how the Alliance collaborates with and supports LGBTQ+ youth.