We talk with a higher ed DEI expert get her thoughts on the current climate of STEM for LGBTQIA+ identifying students and staff, plus taking a hard look on the health of your own status as an ally in a cultural climate hostile to equity concerns.
Please share your story. How did you get involved in advocating for trans and queer-identifying people in higher ed – specifically in STEM?
During my years as a park ranger, I co-supervised a transgender person who educated me about my cisgendered privilege. In our schools and parks, there were no gender neutral restrooms and no gender affirming health care. Our organization prioritized program delivery without acknowledging practices that excluded trans people. They were often misgendered by students and public, and biased terminology alienated them further.
As their supervisor, I was not doing enough. They could not continue to be the lone person constantly self-advocating. They asked me to leverage my privilege as an authority figure to increase access and meet their basic needs as a professional in environmental sciences.
What are some everyday practices that trans & queer allies can implement to help create more inclusive, safe spaces in academia – particularly at the leadership and faculty levels?
Use inclusive language. Mention pronouns in introductions, emails, business cards, badges, and publications to normalize the practice. Avoid using dead names (the birth name of people who are in process or have completed transitioning) to keep cisgender privilege in check.
Show support visually with Pride accessories and safe space decorations.
Celebrate trans STEM contributions all year. Initiate conversations about trans icons to increase exposure to non-dominant information.
Train as an ally. Self educate and seek professional development to support trans folks on campus.
Visit www.susbdei.com to learn more about ally leadership coaching!
Transgender rights and issues of identity politics are at the center of American culture at the moment. What are some best practices that you’ve seen at various institutions and what would you recommend?
Reach out to your expansive educator network!
Cal Poly Humboldt engages a network of STEM and LGBTQPIA+ educators. Ciencia Para Todos coordinated partnerships with El Centro Académico Cultural, Indian Natural Resources, Science & Engineering Program, and LGBTQPIA+ students to increase access to science for marginalized identities.
They host outreach programs to increase science reach in communities that would not have known about Cal Poly Humboldt’s opportunities. They created a science book in Spanish for youth and offer programming to pipeline STEM students to campus and introduce professors as mentors.
- IG @cienciaparatodos_cph
cienciaparatodospch@gmail.com
https://hsucienciapt.wixsite.com/original
This approach is robust due to multi-partner collaboration, increasing buy-in and reducing barriers in STEM. A common allyship mistake is to focus on only one minority group rather than pooling resources together to create strong community networks.
What are some of the most significant barriers that trans and queer professionals currently face in STEM disciplines, and what strategies have you found most effective in addressing these challenges?
Willful ignorance – when a person chooses to be unaware despite resources being available – is the most significant barrier trans and queer professionals face in STEM. When educators are willfully ignorant they embody microaggressions of minimization and dismissal, which can escalate to discriminations such as erasure and inaction when harmful situations occur.
Self education is critical in saving lives of trans and queer STEM students. According to The Trevor Project, 37% of LGBTQ youth have seriously considered suicide. More than one in five Gen Z identify as LGBTQ based on Gallup’s recent March 2024 Poll (LINK).
Self education strategies:
- Pursue a mix of different mediums – Critically review primary sources from mainstream media, social media, and different perspectives to make well informed decisions that consider short and long term impacts for yourself and others
- Seek to understand – Acceptance is not necessary to learn, but understanding different points of view is crucial for allyship. Do you understand and disagree or do you truthfully not understand and disagree with a person’s perspective?
- Ask questions – Use open-ended questions to maintain focus on discovering root issues instead of villainizing or judging harmful behaviors.
Your recent campus workshop focused on queer advocacy for DEI leaders. What are the key takeaways that you believe are most crucial for creating meaningful change in higher education?
To create meaningful change in higher education the culture needs to change. Culture is the shared collective values of multiple individuals in an organization. When many different people share the same values this informs a larger culture shaped by their thoughts which in turn motivates actions and behaviors to achieve a common goal.
Takeaway 1:
Change begins with you. Be truthful with yourself to assess if you are truly doing everything in your ability to increase access for others with less access. Check in with trusted peers who can give you honest constructive feedback, not just compliments.
Takeaway 2:
Allyship is contagious, sooner or later folks will be curious and want to learn how to be allies. Prepare yourself and take an empathy based approach that acknowledges their very real feelings and hold each other accountable for the behaviors that cause harm to others. Then work together to adopt equitable behaviors for all, also known as the universal design.
In your research, what are some emergent approaches that support the recruitment, retention, and advancement of trans and queer-identifying individuals in STEM?
I am not a trans person and following DEI leadership principles I went straight to the source to conduct a series of one on one ethnographic interviews of LGBTQPIA+, gender expansive, and allies in STEM professions and higher academia.
Recommendations based on insights from the research
- Create pipelines with LGBTQPIA+ identity groups to meet their specific hiring needs and remove cisgenderedist and heterosexist barriers with reasonable accommodations to ensure truly diverse hiring
- Develop inclusive policy pertaining to facilities, inclusive healthcare, codes of conduct, and professional development protocol to proactively rather than reactively support and protect the rights of trans folks
- Allocate annual budget to the above mentioned to solidify a long term cultural shift for the legacy of the organization and hold organizational leaders accountable as allies
What cultural shifts do you believe are necessary to create truly welcoming and supportive environments for LGBTQ+ professionals in STEM?
A case study by Arizona State University found 52.4% LGBTQPIA+ STEM instructors are not out to undergraduate students – more than half of one thousand two hundred participants in higher education STEM. To create a welcoming environment, allies must come out with their support and be active upstanders when they observe discriminatory practices.
Martin Luther King Jr. was effective at gaining allyship support because he invited multiple marginalized groups and dominant allies (White folks) to join the cause for Black civil rights. Conversely, trans and queer STEM professionals need support from cis gendered and heterosexual STEM professionals to create large scale behavior change via a cultural shift for welcoming class rooms, labs, and campus. It will take the efforts of every student, educator, and department to commit to being open and out with their allyship.
References:
- The Trevor Project (Jan 2024). Facts About Suicide Among LGBTQ+ Young People. https://www.thetrevorproject.org/resources/article/facts-about-lgbtq-youth-suicide/.
- Jones, M. Jefferey (March 2024). LGBTQ+ Identification in U.S. Now at 7.6%. Gallup. https://news.gallup.com/poll/611864/lgbtq-identification.aspx.
- Busch, et al. (2024). Few LGBTQ+ Science and Engineering Instructors Come Out to Students, Despite Potential Benefits. CBE- Life Sciences Education. DOI:10.1187/cbe.23-10-018.
