GUILDERLAND — Shakespeare speaks to Riley Gohlke-Schermer.

Last year, Riley played the part of Caliban — the subhuman son of a witch — in “The Tempest.”

“I like to play crazy roles,” Riley said. “Shakespeare was a very open person for his times…very liberal.”

Riley, a junior at Guilderland High School, cites several Shakespearean characters, like Viola in “Twelfth Night” who dresses as a man to gain the trust of a duke, crossing the line between male and female in an era when men were the only actors often playing the parts of women.

“Shakespeare had characters almost be transgender,” says Riley who is transgender.

Riley, who uses the pronoun “they,” describes themself as “gender fluid.”

Riley has two lesbian parents. “I love them more than anything in the world. I always knew I was fine to be who I want to be.”

Growing up, Riley said, “I loved wearing dresses but leaned toward masculine toys.” G.I. Joe and remote-control cars were favorites.

Middle school was tough for Riley. “Because my parents were lesbians, people assumed I would be gay.” Riley remembers thinking at the time that they (Riley) would never be gay because, “If I had children, it would destroy their lives at schools.”

Riley’s own life felt destroyed. “People in science class yelled, ‘You’re gay.’ They threw pens at me. They threw garbage in my locker. They threw my stuff on the floor.  They wrote about me on the bathroom wall…Nobody speaks up. Everybody’s a bystander….Only after I refused to go to school was I switched out.”

The science lab had the “worst tormentors,” Riley said. “They were relentless. In other classes, you didn’t need to team up. That’s why I hate group projects. I prefer to be independent.”

Through it all, Riley said, “I was always accepted at home.”

In ninth grade, at the high school, Riley recalled, “I wanted to try to learn to accept myself. I started attending Alliance,” Riley said, referring to a club at Guilderland High School supportive of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students. “I was almost homophobic in seventh and eighth grades.” Being tormented like that, Riley said, “You start resenting your parents….In ninth grade, I broke down internal barriers.”

At the end of ninth grade, Riley recalled, “I came out about my sexuality.” In 10th grade, Riley came out to their closest friend as “gender fluid.”

Riley started going to the Pride Center in Albany and made friends there. “It helped me figure out who I am.”

Riley is now co-president of Alliance and recently spoke to the Guilderland School Board about the need for gender-neutral bathrooms at the high school. (See editorial.)

“It’s been a spiritual journey,” Riley told The Enterprise, “trying to fit in your own body. I can’t conform to gender stereotypes.”

This year, for the prom, Riley bought both a suit and a dress. “I went cheap on both. Up until the day of the prom, I didn’t know which I’d wear….I ended up wearing the dress. My gender spectrum changes from day to day.”

Riley went to the prom with a girl this year. “I ended up going with my best friend; she was my date.”

Riley plans on wearing the suit to an upcoming ball. “My clothing changes daily,” Riley said. “I have a lot of clothes.”

Asked about who they date, Riley said, “Who I date is different than my gender. I think of gender as completely different than sexuality. I identify as pan-romantic; it’s not a gender-specific attraction.”

Next year, as a Guilderland senior, Riley will spend part of the year at Sage Colleges in a theater program. Riley has worked designing and building sets and doing lighting for Guilderland Players productions. Riley loves the work and hopes to make it their future.

“The actors are out there but you are the reason why people can see them,” Riley said. “You are all working together to put on this amazing show…When you hear your friends cheering in the audience, it makes it worth it.”

Riley has particularly enjoyed filmmaking and art classes at the high school. “I love drawing nature,” Riley said.

Riley also loves to travel. After graduating next year, Riley hopes to spend the summer taking “a road trip across the country to find my donor father.”

Riley then hopes to go to college to study set design or theatrical production.

The stage crew, Riley says, is made up of “very accepting people.” Riley went on, “It’s the funnest thing in the world for me.”

Riley has two older sisters, both recent Guilderland graduates. “One sister is super supportive,” although she struggles with the correct pronouns. “The other sister has a hard time with accepting my parents as well,” said Riley. “Both of them are straight.”

Riley estimates “in Alliance alone” there are around 20 transgender people. Riley believes, since so many aren’t out, there may be many, many more.

The group decided, as a first issue, to work on getting gender-neutral bathrooms and locker rooms at the high school.

“It could be easily done by the start of the next school year,” Riley said. The group would like it as “soon as possible,” Riley said. “It would make people more open and comfortable.”

Riley believes it wouldn’t be costly, largely involving the changing of signs. “I don’t feel comfortable reading a sign on a door with a label. These would be all-gender restrooms. Everybody would have their own cubicle inside.”

Issues beyond bathrooms and locker rooms, Riley said, include “making it easier for students to come out to their teachers...but not have it relayed back to their parents. A lot aren’t accepted at home.”

Riley went on, “In health class, they teach safe sex. But it’s just straight, heterosexual sex….Teachers have said we don’t need to learn about this…It’s very dangerous.”

Once in college, Riley would like to take a semester off “to build education around LGBT” — a reference to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues.

“Harvey Milk isn’t in history textbooks,” Riley said of the first openly gay man elected to public office — in California in 1978. “And there’s maybe one paragraph on the Stonewall riots,” Riley said of the uprising against a 1968 police raid at the Greenwich Village’s Stonewall Inn, spawning the gay liberation movement.

“Without education, there’s ignorance,” concluded Riley. “And ignorance leads to the kind of bullying I had in seventh grade. We have to do something about it.”