Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender Resource Center

Mission Statement

The LGBT Resource Center provides support, education, and advocacy regarding sexual orientation and gender identity for the UC Riverside campus community.

Diversity Activities

Allies Safe Zone Program
 http://out.ucr.edu/programs/allies.htm

Allies Safe Zone members include staff, faculty, and students at UC Riverside who display an ALLY placard outside their office or residence hall room. This sign identifies them as individuals who are willing to provide a safe haven, a listening ear, and support for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people or anyone dealing with sexual orientation or gender identity issues. All Allies have attended a training seminar to learn about the benefits and responsibilities of being an Ally.

Every Ally has signed a contract before posting their placard. Allies may choose to attend an additional Trans Allies seminar to learn more about supporting Trans and Intersex people. Allies Brown Bag discussions educate the campus year-round.

Trans Remembrance Display
http://out.ucr.edu/events/transdisplay.htm

UC Riverside honors the National Transgender Day of Remembrance with a week-long display memorial to commemorate each of the 350+ known victims of transgender related violence. Posters include the name, biography, photo when available, and details of the hate crime death of a Transgender person. The Transgender Day of Remembrance was set aside to memorialize those who were killed due to anti-transgender hatred or prejudice. The event is held in November to honor Rita Hester, whose murder on November 28th, 1998 kicked off the "Remembering Our Dead" web project and a San Francisco candlelight vigil in 1999. Rita Hester's murder - like most anti-transgender murder cases - has yet to be solved.Winter Student Retreat
http://out.ucr.edu/events/retreat.htm

The Winter Student Retreat challenges students to look at the LGBT community through a social justice lens. We focus on creating unity through discourse about our differences and inequities. In addition, students make new friends, build community, experience personal growth, explore leadership opportunities and get energized for Winter and Spring campus activities.

Peer Connections Mentoring Program
http://out.ucr.edu/programs/peerconnections.htm

The Peer Connections Mentoring Program aims to create connections between LGBT students and campus resources and community, in addition to connections between the larger campus and LGBT awareness. Peer Connections Mentors facilitates these connections through one on one interaction with mentees, and  through larger campus programming and outreach.

Tuesday Rap Groups
http://out.ucr.edu/programs/rapgroups.htm

Tuesday Rap Groups are supportive discussion groups facilitated by UCR staff. Groups include Fluidity (to talk about the genderqueer, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning communities, or the need for any labels around sexual orientation or gender identity); QPOC (recommended for self-identified people of color to explore multiple identities and the intersections of race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender identity); Grrrl Talk (recommended for lesbian, bisexual, and questioning women and their allies); and Guy Talk (recommended for gay, bisexual, and questioning men and their allies).

The Coming Out Monologues
http://www.out.ucr.edu [specific web page to launch by end of May]

“The Coming Out Monologues,” created and organized by UCR students, premiered in 2007, Modeled after Eve Ensler’s “The Vagina Monologues,” the project celebrates the diversity of experiences and identity. The monologues include stories from numerous and unique backgrounds and perspectives, including coming out as an ally, as straight, or as just sexually different from the norm, from the perspectives of friends of people in the LGBTQIA community, as well as members of the LGBTQIA community itself. The monologues are performed as a celebration of identity at the end of the National Day of Silence.

Voices of Discovery (2005)

Voices of Discovery was a pilot dialogue program in 2005. It brought together queer students (LGBT), both white and students of color, to share about their life & campus experiences related to their identities. The group was led by two facilitators, one representing each identity involved (queer person of color & white queer person). The group met over a 4-week period for 2 hours each meeting. Please contact Jami Grosser, jami.grosser@ucr.edu or 951.827.2267 for more information.

NOTE: Stonewall Hall and Gender Neutral Housing are UCR

Housing Options. The contact person is Jeanette Bradeen, jeanette.bradeen@ucr.edu, 951.827.6500. I am including them in this document because our web site and collaborate relationship with Residence Life supports these diversity resources. I suggest you also
contact Housing regarding their other special interest halls such as PATH and Mundo.

Stonewall Hall
http://out.ucr.edu/campus/stonewallhall.htm

Stonewall Hall welcomes students of all gender identities and sexual orientations who wish to join an intentional living community. Stonewall Hall celebrates and affirms the cultural experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and questioning students and their allies, while welcoming the diverse and complex identities of every resident. Stonewall Hall works closely with Housing, the LGBT Resource Center, LGBIT Studies Minor, and UCR student groups to create a community of respect and a sense of family for all residents. Stonewall Hall staff-initiated programming reaches out to all residence hall students with cultural, educational, and social programming throughout the year.

Gender Neutral Housing Option
http://out.ucr.edu/campus/gnhousing.htm

In 2005, UC Riverside became the first public university in the nation to offer gender neutral housing as an option to every student. Currently located in Pentland Hills, gender neutral housing allows same-gender

roommates, opposite-gender roommates, or other gender-identity roommate pairings, regardless of physical sex. (To clarify, gender identities are numerous and include man, woman, and transgender, among many others.) Thus, residents of gender neutral housing may request any roommate whosoever.

Future Diversity Activities

CAC on the Status of LGBTs Student Assessment Project
http://out.ucr.edu/campus/cac.htm

In Spring 2007, the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on the Status of LGBTs will conduct a qualitative research project on the needs and experiences of LGBT students at UCR. Focus groups of students, staff and faculty will investigate how UC Riverside can better serve LGBT students, including the specific needs of LGBT students of color. This research project follows Campus Climate Surveys for LGBT people at UCR in 2001 and 2004. Results of past assessments are on the web.

Contacts