Education and anti-discrimination regarding sexual and gender diversity
SCHLAU is an educational and anti-discrimination project against homophobia, biphobia and transphobia among young people. This means derogatory or hostile behavior towards homosexuality, bisexuality and pansexuality, trans* and inter* as well as asexuality and aromanticism.
Our goal is to positively influence how sexual and gender diversity is dealt with in schools.
That’s why SCHLAU reduces and prevents discrimination of all kinds by imparting knowledge and reflecting on different lifestyles.
We are a team of many volunteers and two full-time social workers. We are all part of the queer community ourselves and hold workshops at schools and in the PULS* youth center. These provide information about LGBTIAQ* terms and, with the involvement of young people, various playful methods of anti-discrimination and human rights work are used.
Talk to queer people – not about them!
SCHLAU follows a peer-to-peer approach. This means that it is very important to us to meet young people on an equal footing and to take their opinions and statements seriously without judging them. This approach is intended to prevent the students from feeling inhibited in their statements by a suspected or obvious hierarchy between young people and team members.
At the same time, we also want to be respected. We think we can achieve this particularly well by talking to us rather than about us. In our opinion, this concept, characterized by mutual appreciation, contributes greatly to open and exciting conversations.
An example method
This becomes particularly clear with the method of biographical storytelling, in which the young people are given the opportunity to anonymously ask the team members questions, which are then answered as openly as possible. Typical questions include: “How did you come out?”, “Have you already been discriminated against because of your sexual orientation?” or “Do you want children?”
More of us
You can find further information about specific planning, the course of workshops and current news about us here:
Homepage: http://duesseldorf.schlau.nrw
facebook: www.facebook.com/schlau.duesseldorf
instagram: www.instagram.com/schlau_duesseldorf.
If you are interested in our work and think we should visit your school, please contact us! The best way to contact us is by email at info@schlau-duesseldorf.com.
We can be reached by telephone from Monday to Friday between 9:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. on 01577 – 46 00 385 if we are not conducting workshops. We look forward to your message/call!
