Nearly 2% of High School Students in the U.S. Identify as Transgender

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has concluded a study finding that almost 2% of current high school students identify as transgender.

The CDC study comes from a 2017 survey it conducts in which it asked 131,901 students across nine urban school districts in 10 states various questions, including, for the first time, one about gender identity.

The choices for the question, which was optional, were “No, I am not transgender” (94.4%), “Yes, I am transgender” (1.8%), “I am not sure if I am transgender” (1.6%), and “I do not know what this question is asking” (2.1%).

Data collected allowed the CDC to also draw the conclusion that 27% of high school students identifying as transgender feel unsafe at or going to or from school, 35% are bullied at school, and 35% have attempted suicide. For comparison, the national average percentage of all high school teens who have attempted suicide was 17.2% in the same year.

The report determined that “transgender youths in high school appear to face serious risk for violence victimization, substance use, and suicide, as well as some sexual risk behaviors, indicating a need for programmer efforts to better support the overall health of transgender youths.”

Basically, what LGBTQ organizations have already been saying, but backed up with data.

“In order to make policy changes, we need to have hard numbers to point to,” said Caitlin Clark, a research associate at GLSEN.

The CDC further suggested creating anti-bullying programs to support transgender students, as well as training staff to be allies and advocates for the students.