A study recently published in the journal Pediatrics says that supportive environments can play a role in reducing the suicide rate by gay teens, but the suicide-attempt rate for gay teenagers is still much higher than for straight kids - 20.5% compared with 4.2%. The study's author, Mark Hatzenbuehler is a researcher at Columbia University's Center for the Study of Social Inequality and Health.

Researchers then created a composite index to measure supportive environments for gay teens. Supportive factors were number of same-sex couples in each county, the number of registered Democrats, whether schools had gay-straight alliances, and whether schools in the county had anti-bullying and anti-discrimination policies. 

Legal Rights for High School GSAs

USA Department of Education GSA Policy

http://www2.ed.gov/policy/elsec/guid/secletter/110607.html

General

http://www.aclu.org/lgbt-rights_hiv-aids/library

"Equal Access Act/Gay-Straight Alliances".

 http://www.aclu.org/files/assets/gsaletter_20110614.pdf