LGBT proposals have merit

One of the main benefits of a quality college experience is the opportunity for all students to challenge their unwarranted preconceptions and racial, religious, social and gender prejudices and thus grow as a person. Considering this, any attempts to strengthen campus offices like the African-American Student Enrichment and Latino Initiatives Office or the newly formed Office of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Initiatives are quite laudable.

While they weren’t advocating for the LGBT office per se, the group of students in UT’s higher education master’s program who compared UT’s LGBT office to ones like it at other universities are doing just this. By doing the comparisons and generating suggested improvements for UT’s fledgling office, they are helping to provide all UT students with a more valuable and inclusive college learning experience.

Two of the suggestions offered by this group are quite prudent and should be pursued.

The first one proposes the development and distribution of a confidential survey among the UT community to gauge interest in and awareness of the LGBT office. An organization can act as an excellent resource in learning about others and achieving self-improvement, but this doesn’t mean much if people don’t utilize it. Without knowing the LGBT office’s standing in the community, UT runs the risk of allowing it to languish in obscurity. And, if people are aware of the office, UT can ascertain through the survey what strengths and weaknesses it has through the eyes of the respondents.

The second suggestion is even better. While the office’s outreach should definitely extend throughout UT, the student research group suggested it should even have a relationship with local area high school students. The LGBT office could help ease lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students’ transition to college life, showing them that they have a visible ally in the UT community. High school environments are often less friendly than college ones and, with more immature and irrational students, acts of violence and mental intimidation are much more prevalent. Anything UT’s LGBT office can do to counteract this unhealthy and unfortunate phenomenon should be carried out.

But, in order to truly relate LGBT concerns to UT students, UT should also consider placing a greater emphasis on developing those departments and courses that expose students directly to these concerns (such as the Women’s and Gender Studies Department). After all, the best place to start a culture shift is in the classroom.

As a final note, UT community members should recognize the important work being done here by these education graduate students. Wherever the Judith Herb College of Education goes in its future, particularly with its master’s programs, it should certainly continue to engage students with these types of research projects. Without them, our educational system might become mired in dated techniques and stagnate while the world around it demands progressive change.

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