When Jeremy Dias was walking home from school one day in Grade 11, someone called him a fag.

Dark-haired, skinny and one of the few non-white students at his high school in Sault Ste. Marie, he kept walking. He was used to ignoring such barbs. But his tormentor wasn’t finished.

“Before I knew it, I was on the ground and he and his friends were kicking me,” said Dias, now 27. “And while I was on the ground, I was thinking I never thought it could happen to me.”

Dias, who came out the previous year, woke up in the hospital two hours after the beating. The next day, his principal told him it was good he was beaten up — it would toughen him up and he wouldn’t complain as much about being bullied.

He got through it. But the bullying onslaught becomes too much for many gay teens. Jamie Hubley, the 15-year-old Ottawa boy who committed suicide last weekend, was bullied for years on end and expressed frustration on his blog at being singled out by his peers. His father, an Ottawa city councillor, says bullying directly contributed to his son’s death.

Jamie’s suicide note said he could not endure three more years until his high school graduation.

“I don’t want to wait three more years, this hurts too much. How do you even know it will get better? It’s not.”

Hubley’s death is drawing renewed attention to what experts say is the largest failure gripping Canadian schools: their inability to create a safe environment for LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered) students. The problems lie in curriculums that ignore gay people, teachers inadequately trained to deal with homophobic bullying, and a lack of support for those who try to address the problem.

Egale Canada, a group fighting for equality for gays and lesbians, released a nationwide study in May exploring homophobia in schools — the first of its kind. It found two-thirds of LGBT youth don’t feel safe in school. One-fifth of them experience physical harassment or assault at school because of their sexuality. Half of all students surveyed said they hear homophobic slurs at least once a day.

“It’s a daily grind . . . it just eats away at you,” Dias said. “ ‘That’s so gay’ doesn’t make anyone commit suicide. But when you hear it every day and all the time, day in and day out, there’s no escape. It’s ongoing cycle of hate.”

In Grade 12, Dias tried to form a school club to promote a positive environment for LGBT students, just as Hubley did before he died. He wasn’t allowed. The school board told him it did “not permit the posting of material advocating any special lifestyle in classrooms or hallways.”

University professors who study the issue of homophobia in schools say such groups are part of a new social movement. Kristopher Wells, an education professor at the University of Alberta, said schools are the next major battleground after the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2005.

Dias didn’t back down. He took the matter to the Ontario Human Rights Commission. About four years later, he won a $5,000 settlement. He used the money to found Jer’s Vision, a group that aim to end homophobic bullying through scholarships and workshops.

“The vast majority of students can go through 13 years of school in this country and never once hear a teacher refer to the existence of LGBTQ people,” said Catherine Taylor, a University of Winnipeg education professor who helped conduct the Egale study. “There’s nothing to counter the unofficial curriculum of the hallways, which is that LGBTQ people are stupid and worthless.”

Suicide is the second-leading cause of death for people aged 10 to 24 in Canada, behind accidents. It’s the leading cause of death for sexual minority youth, according to experts.

Most teachers recognize homophobia exists in their hallways, but don’t feel they have the expertise to handle it well due to a lack of training. Still others may fear repercussions from parents or administrators if they openly discuss it, Taylor said.

School curriculums don’t raise LGBT issues with children from an early age, said Helen Kennedy, executive director of Egale Canada.

“My two boys are 5 and 8, and they’re not going to see stories about our family in their curriculum as they’re growing up. There’s this constant negative reinforcement about what it means to be gay,” she said.

Ontario’s Keeping our Kids Safe at School Act, which came into effect in February 2010, requires teachers to report and respond to serious bullying incidents.

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Debra Pepler, a York University professor and bullying expert who advised the government on the law, said teachers have told her incidents still aren’t being reported. Teachers don’t spend as much time in the halls as they once did; some do report incidents, but principals don’t always follow through, she said. “I think everyone in the system is discouraged.”

The Toronto District School Board has a “positive space campaign.” At least one teacher at every school will be trained in how to support students when sexual orientation and gender identity issues arise.

But the anti-bullying legislation is not rigorously enforced by the ministry, said Ken Jeffers, the TDSB’s gender-based violence prevention coordinator.

Meanwhile, in Alberta, school curriculum doesn’t reference sexual orientation from kindergarten to Grade 12.

In 2009, the province passed Bill 44, which requires school boards to give parents written notice when sexual orientation is going to be covered in class. Alison Redford, the new premier, has indicated she’s open to revisiting the legislation.

The bill has created a discriminatory environment for sexual minorities, said Wells, who does extensive work in high schools.

“I’ve had principals tell me directly, ‘We don’t have any lesbians or gay kids in our schools.’ And I’ve said, ‘No, your school’s not a safe place. That’s why you can’t see them.’”

Tackling homophobia in schools requires a national strategy, Wells said.

“We need our education leaders, our ministers, to stand up and recognize these kids,” he said.

Top politicians are taking notice. On Thursday, government MPs appeared in an “It Gets Better” video online. The campaign launched last year after a rash of suicides among gay teenagers in the U.S.

The campaign isn’t perfect, Wells said, because it absolves school systems of their responsibility to keep students safe.

“It’s not about ‘it gets better.’ It’s about adults standing up and making it better.”