At Harvard, It's Getting Better

UPDATED: Oct. 8, 2012, at 3:54 p.m.

When Brandy A. L. Machado ’14 began her freshman year, she told herself she would never come out of the closet.

“I distanced myself from people. I thought that every person I got close to is another person who might find out,” she said.

Raised in Lompoc, Calif., where she felt the gay community was “nonexistent,” Machado was used to hiding that she was a lesbian. At Harvard, she was still hesitant to reveal her sexual orientation. It took Machado an entire semester to decide that she would finally share her secret. She attended her first BGLTQ event in February of her freshman year—and at that first event, she met all her blockmates.

“I had an epiphany all of a sudden and said to myself: ‘All right, I’m going to do this,’” Machado said. “I told myself that I could use one less stress in second semester.”

Machado’s freshman experience was characteristic of the BGLTQ student experience just two years ago. Current upperclassmen say that they had to actively seek opportunities to meet people and to access resources for BGLTQ students. Despite the existence of spaces on campus like the Women’s Center, Contact, and Room 13, many students were unaware of the counseling services that could be found there.

However, those upperclassmen as well as a new College-funded office have strived to change circumstances for the Class of 2016. Thanks to the recent opening of the BGLTQ Office for Student Life and the restructuring of Queer Students and Allies, freshmen say they feel more comfortable coming out than their recent predecessors did.

“There’s a good vibe on campus for BGLTQ students,” Javier F. Aranzales ’16 said. “I instantly felt comfortable and decided that I was going to be myself.”

STATUS UPDATES

Even before students started flocking to Harvard for the start of the school year, many of them had already met each other online. Aranzales and fellow freshman Thomas V. Earle ’16 started a Facebook group over the summer specifically for BGLTQ students in the Class of 2016, an idea that previous classes never tried.

“We want to make this a support group off the bat for everyone in our grade,” Earle wrote to welcome new members to the group. “Share experiences, tell stories, tell jokes, sing us a song, dance on a table, do whatever you want! It’s a free world, baby! But let’s start Harvard off right! Out and proud!”

On the Facebook group, students posted links to articles and scheduled video chats. One freshman from India wrote that he had never experienced a BGLTQ community. The post received 31 comments from peers expressing their support.

“We bonded through posting or sending articles, and it became apparent early on that this was a pretty accepting place,” said Garrett C. Allen ’16, who was a member of the Facebook group. “Even upperclassmen joined the group. They gave us advice and talked about how accepting the community was in general. It definitely made the transition easier.”

Students have also used their own Facebook pages as a means of publicly coming out. Jordan T. Weiers ‘16, who has his Facebook profile set to “Interested in: Men,” said that this very open display of sexual orientation helped to avoid uncomfortable conversations with roommates.

“There was never a moment when I had to say, ‘Hey guys, guess what: I’m gay!’” Weiers said. “It just wasn’t necessary. They knew and they understood.”

A 'LIBERAL HAVEN'

Several students who openly identify as BGLTQ said that they come from towns that are not as accepting of their sexual orientations as Harvard is, and the Class of 2016 is no different. They said that the environment on campus, however, is particularly conducive to coming out.

“I come from this place in Minnesota called Savage—I kid you not,” Weiers said. “There are a lot of evangelical Christians in the area, and there’s a lot of hatred when it comes to LGBTQ people.”

In comparison, Weiers and others refer to Boston—and particularly Harvard—as a “liberal haven.” Students said they find the campus to be generally very respectful.

“I got here and I suddenly felt very free,” said Indiana T. Seresin ’15, who grew up in London. “Acceptance just wasn’t there at my high school, but I’m comfortable now that I’m here.”

For Gabriel H. Bayard ’15, joining the First-Year Urban Program helped him realize how many BGLTQ students there were on campus.

“A large number of the FUP leaders in my year and this year were BGLTQ students,” said Bayard, who returned to FUP this year as a leader himself. “I remember going to a panel to talk about BGLTQ issues and at least half of the FUP leaders were leading the panel.”

Daniel, a current freshman whose name has been changed because his parents do not know that he is gay, said he felt that FUP made queer identity part of a larger conversation.

“Even students who were straight were sharing stories of how they discovered they were straight and came out,” he said. “It really made me feel like I was no different and that I was part of the larger community.”

HOT SPOTS

The Class of 2016 comes to Harvard at the same time as Harvard’s first-ever paid director of BGLTQ student life, who heads the office for BGLTQ students that opened in March.

“The creation of a centralized office is a big deal,” freshman proctor Joseph J. Vitti ’10 said. “It sends the message that there is a community here for you, even if there may be people who don’t accept you.”

Laura V. Herrera ’13, co-chair of Gay, Lesbians, Or, Whatever, said that the office can act as a unifying space for BGLTQ life on campus, something she had felt was missing.

“I never felt part of the BGLTQ community as understood by the QSA,” she said. “QSA membership was primarily made up of middle-class white males and never actively tried to reach out to queer students of color. I think we are divided.”

Some students like Herrera have left QSA for more specific BGLTQ groups like GLOW, for students of color; the Trans Task Force, for students who identify as transgender; and BAGELS, for queer students who are Jewish.

All those groups have stopped by the new office. Kenneth Mai ’15, the treasurer of QSA, said that he was glad to see the entire space filled at the open house held in the office in August.

Meanwhile, Mai said that the QSA is restructuring the way the organization works to make it more inclusive for the Class of 2016. Instead of being obligated to attend a certain number of events to be placed on the mailing list, all students have to do now is check a box on a form to indicate interest.

“Our goal is not to make all students come to QSA,” he said. “The goal is to make sure that everyone feels happy and safe and that those people who need help and who want a sense of community have somewhere to go.”

IT GETS BETTER

Students still point out concrete ways that Harvard can make new students more comfortable.

Sasanka N. Jinadasa ’15 mentioned the annual required instructive program Sex Signals for freshmen as an example of a heteronormative Harvard tradition.

“They offer an alternate Sex Signals for BGLTQ students, but I can’t imagine it’d be that difficult to create a general safe sex presentation for all sexualities,” Jinadasa said. “If this continues, not only are queer students made to go to a different event, they are publicly ostracized from a communal freshman experience.”

This year, freshman proctors were given copies of the book “It Gets Better” by Dan Savage and Terry Miller to help them become more sensitive to some of the problems students may be facing.

Vitti, who volunteered to specialize in BGLTQ freshman life as a proctor, said that he also acts as an extra resource for freshmen who are questioning their sexuality.

“I’m here to listen, above all else, and maybe give advice where I can,” he said.

Seresin, who is a Peer Advising Fellow for freshmen and is also a Crimson magazine writer, said that while proctors are more aware of issues of sexuality among students thanks to the book giveaway, there still are not enough BGLTQ PAFs.

“Nearly every single PAF is straight,” she said. “They should start asking about sexuality on the PAF application, because freshmen may need someone to talk to besides their proctor.”

But on the whole, even Bayard—who has critiqued many Harvard policies through the Occupy movement last fall and other protests—called Harvard a great place to be a BGLTQ-identifying student.

“I rarely give praise to Harvard, but it really doesn’t do a terrible job,” he said. “I think people are uncomfortable with feeling uncomfortable about different sexual orientations here, which is pretty rare.”

—Staff writer Michelle Denise L. Ferreol can be reached at mferreol@college.harvard.edu.