How to find out if your teacher is gay

Willie Edward Taylor Carver, Jr. But despite the accolades, he may not return to the classroom next fall. This interview was edited for length and clarity. I grew up Appalachian. There were moments of extreme poverty: no electricity, no running water. School was a place where we could eat.

Having so many issues with violence, dependency, poverty, hopelessness—school was not that. School was a place of light and hope. My teachers not only expanded my world, but they injected it with light and love. They gave me shoes [they bought with] their personal money.

I have about first cousins. I was the first to go to college. This whole journey is because teachers pushed me. There was never another [career] option for me—this is what I want to do with my life. No one will protect you, including me. You know, we were actually having progress as a country.

For the most part, people have been accepting. And then it kind of changed, both on an individual scale for me and on a national scale for all of us, probably four or five years ago. And I think for them, what was lost is the sense that America is heteronormative and that queerness is bad.

Therefore, they felt emboldened. Things that I thought were in the past were not. The bannings started happening. The effect that this has in real time on the classroom is immediate. And in America for some reason, equality is a bad word now. In America for some reason right now, a Black woman speaking is a bad thing.

My existence is somehow immoral.

Am I Gay Quiz

You matter. And students decorated the board in a delightful way—with pride flags, other flags, just everything that sort of represents who they are so they can feel valued. This led to horrific death threats [against Morgan]. It is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.

You can feel free to share this comment if you wish to do so. It was unclear what was [considered] unacceptable, [the message on the board or the death threats]. It creates an absolutely unsafe—unfathomably unsafe—working condition for someone whose only goal was to say to students, you matter.

I feel unsafe to return to the classroom. My identity as a human being is a teacher.