A variety of affirming, beneficial services are accessible to LGBTQIA+ students online
Community.
It’s a versatile word, simultaneously a thing and a feeling. It’s a group of people with common interests and also a sense of fellowship with others because of those shared interests.
The Pride Center at Oregon State University is a community where that dual nature is on display. It provides programs and services to members of the LGBTQIA+ community while fostering safe environments where those same students — learning on campus and online through Oregon State Ecampus — feel a sense of belonging.
That’s the type of multilayered support the Pride Center has been offering since 2001. And in its quest to improve its service to students, the center is exploring methods to offer even more tangible benefits.
“Lately we’ve been focusing on not just the experiences or issues we face as LGBTQIA+ people, but also what skills we need to develop to really build a strong community wherever we go in life,” Pride Center director Cindy Konrad says. “We started working with staff on conflict resolution skills, having strong communication skills and setting personal and professional boundaries.
“It’s been powerful to see how that’s helped the staff grow. I’m excited to be able to share these things with the student body.”
There are a number of reasons why OSU Ecampus students and graduates should connect with the Pride Center. And speaking of numbers, here’s a numbers-filled look at the center — accompanied by comments from Konrad — and its broader community.
Follow the Pride Center on social media
You can engage with Oregon State students and staff in the LGBTQIA+ community and stay informed of happenings on the Pride Center’s social channels.
3 ways (among others) to engage
1. Students and Pride Center staff increasingly interact in group and one-on-one settings via Discord, a popular online messaging platform. The pandemic made this a necessity at first, but it’s been adopted for future use. “It’s a really good place for Ecampus students to get some hangout time with people who identify similarly.”
2. Are you a creative person? Check out to the center’s biannual literary zine, “Papercloud.” You can read students’ writings and view their artwork — and submit your own to the non-competitive, fully online journal.
3. The pandemic also helped the Pride Center learn how to better host events that are inclusive of those who can’t come to campus. “A new goal is to make in-person events hybrid events that are also streamed online via Zoom. We’re super excited to have people participate from a distance.”
1 vibrant LGBTQIA+ partner community
While the Pride Center serves students of all backgrounds, the folks at Oregon State Diversity and Cultural Engagement created SOL — an initiative that plays an active role in improving the university’s climate for LGBTQIA+ people of color.
SOL is based at the Pride Center on the Corvallis campus, but it works hand in hand with all seven of OSU’s cultural resource centers. “It’s a connector in all of DCE that really creates specific space for queer and trans students of color. SOL provides opportunities for multiracial folks to interact with people who have similar experiences at a predominantly white institution and help one another explore their identities.”
5 tips on how to be a good ally
Konrad offered these guidelines on how folks outside the community can support and advocate for LGBTQIA+ rights:
1. “Humility is a really good trait in somebody who’s trying to be an ally. Recognize you’re engaging with a community you don’t belong to.”
2. “Be a good guest in a space that’s not yours.”
3. “Listen and be willing to learn.”
4. “Do the work of learning, not just by asking members to tell you or teach you things.”
5. “Recognize that you are going to screw up. That’s a normal part of engaging in a relationship with any human. What matters is how you handle that and that you work to do better the next time. And consider how to repair that harm. That’s especially important for an ally who may still be learning about the community.”
20+ years of service worth celebrating
The Pride Center has been a welcoming environment since 1981, first in person and also now online. The center’s fast-growing alumni group, OSU Rainbow Connect, “is a great way to continue to participate after you graduate,” Konrad says. “Our alumni are everywhere, and it’s really cool to see people from different places still engaging with us. They don’t have to stop participating when they move.”
