<p>Firstly, to the OP, thank you for being a great parent and advocate for your son.</p>
<p>As an LGBT person involved in the prep school world, a couple thoughts:
- look for schools that possess openly gay male faculty/staff members (don’t be afraid to ask about this when speaking to admissions). We’ve found it’s the gold standard for a supportive community, in that society still has less trust for gay men (especially with kids) than gay women. If a school supports its gay male faculty, it is likely to support its student and to not tolerate an abusive environment within the student body.
- much of the northeast and/or california will likely provide this environment, though in addition to conservative religious environments, as other posters said, I would also watch schools where sports is very important and a “jock,” or “boys will be boys” atmosphere is tolerated.
- a number of the arts-related schools mentioned are good bets. Some will have rolling admissions (and/or will unofficially have rolling admission), as will some other smaller prep schools. I know one poster suggested avoiding the smaller ones. I don’t necessarily agree, but I’d look carefully. Places that are small and outdoorsy (someone already mentioned Putney, which also has good arts, or Holderness are good bets).
- financial aid may be an issue, it sounds like from your original post, so you may have to wait for the next cycle, since while admissions may still be open (even unofficially), at this point, financial aid is usually allocated. In that case, if your son is truly unsafe where he is, please consider homeschooling/online schooling for a year or whether he could live with a relative in a place where the public schools are safer/more LGBT friendly for the next academic year, and make his applications from there.</p>
<p>Good luck. You’re welcome to PM me (if I can figure out how to make that work) with more questions.</p>