It’s the most talked-about school since Jason Priestley and the gang graduated in “Beverly Hills 90210.”
But New York’s new Harvey Milk HS is no TV teen drama.
Starting next month, the school will open in a real-life experiment that has attracted worldwide attention for its liberal ideals, but also has divided the very people it hopes to help – gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender students.
The school, which has operated as a small alternative education program for 19 years, will expand to 174 students within a year with a stylized curriculum and diploma-granting authority. It is strongly backed by the city’s Department of Education, which has supplied $3.2 million in funding for renovations at the Astor Place complex.
Some see Harvey Milk as a long-overdue recognition that not everyone fits in to the traditional model of high school education. Others fear the program is segregationist and will showcase the students in ways far different from the broad acceptance they seek.
Aaron Williams, 20, who lives on the Upper West Side and works in the entertainment industry, was out of the closet when he attended high school in Tennessee. He’s against the new high school.
“It’s what we’re trying to avoid, showing that we’re different,” he said. “It’s retrogressive.”
Kevin, 23, whose surname is being withheld, says he went through high school in the city as a closeted gay because he was on the school football team and was too afraid to come out. He calls the Harvey Milk plan a “double-edged sword.”
He says it will give students the chance to be open and honest with themselves and others, but it also “separates them so then people can look at it and say, ‘That’s the freaks,’ and, ‘Here’s the norm.’ “
Tony Ray, 17, a recent graduate of Frederick Douglass Academy, is also against the Harvey Milk expansion.
He said he appreciated attending a public high school and learned to deal with harassment the old-fashioned way.
“Every high school has their jackass – I ignored it,” he said. “I don’t give in to stupidity.”
But some teens say their painful experiences at regular high schools are ample reason for gays and others to be given the chance to be educated in a more tolerant environment.
Mario, 17, whose surname is also being withheld, recently graduated from the Harvey Milk program after he transferred there for his senior year from Talent Unlimited School, a performing-arts high school in Manhattan.
Mario said he witnessed transgender friends being taunted by security guards at Talent Unlimited and said he was afraid to conduct romantic relationships openly there for fear of harassment.
“You couldn’t have a boyfriend,” he said. “You couldn’t hold hands in the hall. You couldn’t go to the prom with a date.”
He has high praise for his time at Harvey Milk – which he called “lifesaving.”
“You are allowed to be an adolescent without anxiety [there],” he said. “You learn to become an adult and be responsible.”
“Nickie,” 17, a transgender student who lives at the Green Chimneys Gramercy Residence in the East Village, recalls hostile treatment from students and a dismissive attitude from some teachers when she wore “drag” as a student at Unity HS in Manhattan.
She claims she was told by a teacher that she was “nothing but a distraction” to the other students, although school officials could not be contacted to verify that claim.
Roman Goldin, 17, a current senior at Stuyvesant HS in downtown Manhattan, claims a teacher there showed little respect for students who participated in a “Day of Silence” – a national program backed by gay and lesbian organizations to show support for closeted teens.
The teacher “made fun of some of the kids doing it, trying to get them to speak in class,” Goldin said. “She caused some of the kids in the class to cry.”
“She was laughing about it. She was just saying, ‘Oh, look at those students being silent, isn’t that funny.’ “
The incident was never reported to school officials, so it has never been investigated or verified.
Officials at Harvey Milk say the math- and English-heavy program will be academically rigorous. The school will also specialize in computer technology, arts and culinary skills and will offer extracurricular activities like golf, handball and karate.
The school also hopes to compete against other schools in debating and chess.
Additional reporting by Leonard Greene
High school harassment
Some alleged bias incidents at New York City schools:
* Chris Valentin, 19, went to Queens Vocational Technical. In his freshmen year, he says, he was pushed down a darkened stairwell by four classmates who yelled names at him. He says he thought he was going to be raped. He dropped out of the school a month later.
* “Nickie,” 17, a transgender student, says she was in a science class at Unity HS in Manhattan last year when a student threw a chair across the room and shouted “queer” and “faggot.” She claims the teacher ignored the incident. She never graduated.
* Kevin, 23, who was a member of his school football team, said he was afraid to reveal he was gay after teammates punched other gays and burned the varsity jacket of another player suspected of being gay. He went to the prom alone.