Last Wednesday's National Coming Out Day (NCOD) celebration, marked by particularly strong community involvement, capped what the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Center sees as an increasingly receptive environment at the university.
A crowd of Tufts students, faculty and staff packed the lower patio of the campus center for the annual NCOD rally, surprising organizers with a considerably larger turnout than former rallies.
Junior Simon Katz, treasurer of the Queer Straight Alliance, which organizes and runs the rally, was amazed by the turnout and enthusiasm of the crowd, noting improvements from prior years.
"We were very impressed with how [the rally] happened this year," Katz said. "In previous years there [have] been periods of quiet time when people didn't go up and talk … This year there was always somebody going up to the [microphone], and there was a huge crowd that gathered."
NCOD was nationally recognized on Oct. 11, but the LGBT Center celebrated the festivities last Wednesday.
For the first time ever, the campus bookstore sold rainbow shirts with the Tufts logo on them. The LGBT center gave these shirts to students at the 2008 NCOD, but their arrival as official Tufts merchandise in the campus bookstore signifies a great victory for the LGBT community.
University Chaplain David O'Leary has attended and spoken at many NCOD events at Tufts since his arrival in 1998. He said that the use of the official Tufts logo on the rainbow shirts is a big step for the administration.
"Tufts' branding is very important, so [the fact] that it was allowed to be used for the rainbow shirt shows acceptance by [the] administration, marketing and any number of offices that safeguard and protect the Tufts logo," O'Leary said.
According to O'Leary, the large turnout this year reflected a trend of increased participation over the past few Tufts' NCOD celebrations.
"On the Tufts campus, these past years were the most momentous because of the number of people who shared and basically came out — not just students, but senior administration, faculty and employees as well," O'Leary said.
Every year, the rally is composed of a few scheduled speakers followed by an open microphone session for informal student discussion and talks. Democratic State Rep. of Massachusetts Carl Sciortino (LA '00), who continues to support the LGBT community at Tufts, headlined this year's NCOD celebration.
Katz attributed the success of NCOD 2009 and other LGBT events this year to the involvement of the freshman class.
"This year, I think that the freshman class is a lot more involved in the community than previous classes," he said. "A lot of our success this year, and the center itself, has been largely because of the freshman class … It's refreshing."
In conjunction with the LGBT Faculty/Staff Caucus, the LGBT Center created an "Out List" that displayed the names of Tufts community members who identify with the queer community. An e-mail sent out by the two organizations invited faculty, students and staff to publically identify themselves as members of the queer community. Seventy-two individuals signed the list, which the Daily published last Tuesday.
Director of the LGBT Center Tom Bourdon emphasized that the list was not meant to apply pressure to those who have not yet come out but instead to act as a vehicle for queer students to show pride and find role models within the LGBT community. Bourdon said that it is often difficult to distinguish between queer people and heterosexuals who simply support the LGBT community, known as "allies."
"I wanted to have a visible outlet to show that many people queer-identify and have no problems saying it publically," Bourdon said. "I've encountered a phenomenon of students not knowing who is an ally and who is actually a member of the queer community. Students have told me that as a result, it is more difficult to have mentors, people to look up to."
Bourdon added that a consequence of this lack of visible mentors was that it prevented students and members of the LGBT community from getting exposure to same-sex couples with children.
Co-Chair of the LGBT Faculty/Staff Caucus Cindy Stewart, who serves as the assistant director of the Experimental College, believed that the list was a valuable tool to start conversations about the balance of being "out," working and raising a family.
"Tom [Bourdon] mentioned that a lot of students are looking for LGBT staff and faculty to be more of a presence on campus," Stewart said. "He had the idea that as the caucus, we could do something to start the process of providing more of the feeling for students that there are gay, lesbian, transsexual and bisexual staff and they are comfortable enough to come out and make that statement."
