Champlain College in Vermont is looking for more ways to be inclusive of the LGBT community, and they’re starting at orientation.
This year the school is passing out gender pronoun buttons that students can wear to let people know how they prefer to be referred to, according to the school’s Director of News and Public Information Stephen Mease.
“It’s part of ongoing work to be more inclusive,” Mease said by phone Wednesday.
The initiative was the brainchild of student leaders Danelle Berube, director of residential life, and student leaders. Students can select buttons with a variety of pronouns including he, she, xe, or they, or students can opt for a button that identifies them as gender fluid.
Berube said the pins were designed and produced by students, and student leaders wore them during orientation events. The initiative is brand new and the buttons were passed out at orientations which started on Friday.
The school has a number of students who are trans or who identify in a non-binary way, and school officials want to be sensitive to that.
"We wanted to set the stage for an inclusive environment," Berube said. She added that students who saw the pins started asking for them, and the trend is continuing nearly a week into classes.
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The school also opened The Women and Gender Center this year, which Mease said is designed to be an area anyone, regardless of their gender identity, can use as a safe space to study or just hang out.
“We’re responding – students have been asking for this kind of center,” Mease said.
Berube added that there are a variety of programs already available at Champlain, such as staff training and gender neutral housing. Recently a student created a video game that tackled the subject of bystander intervention and sexual violence that the school is using with first-year students.
Champlain has a male to female ration of 60-40, which Mease said is not the norm for higher education, where those numbers are generally flipped. Mease believes this is partially due to the majors offered, such as computer and game design, which were traditionally male professions. Mease said the new programs are meant to bring the conversations about gender and inclusion up front, and that the school is working to create an environmental that is welcoming in all aspects.
Berube said it shouldn't be hard for schools to tweak every day practices to create that welcoming environment.
"We didn't change anything else about orientation - all we did was make a fun button and now students are responding," she said.
