Administrators and teachers should ensure that gay and lesbian students are accorded rights equal to those accorded to heterosexual students. Administrators have the responsibility to find and hire gay and lesbian teachers and to secure for them total equality with heterosexual teachers as well as a supportive, accepting atmosphere; under such conditions, gay and lesbian teachers can serve as effective role models for gay and lesbian students. Teachers and writers can approach the treatment of gay and lesbian students by focusing on promoting equal rights for all persons, by helping students to develop a positive self-concept about their identities, and by promoting mutual understanding and effective communication among students. Teachers should develop an intellectual and emotional recognition of gay and lesbian existence, history, and behavior; should avoid negative stereotypes of gays and lesbians; and should avoid the heterosexual presumption in teaching and writing, striving to eliminate discriminatory language usage and to prohibit abusive classroom criticism of the gay and lesbian cause. Teachers should also recognize the influence of affectional preference on communication with regard to such variables as self-disclosure, language usage, message encoding and decoding, contextual and subcultural differences, field of experience, and relational development and deterioration. (GT)