New LGBTQ Group Hopes to Make a Difference on Campus

By Sebastian Tuinder

The Queer Student Action Alliance collected enough signatures this December to put forward a request to start a new group at Brooklyn College. The prospective group filed its paperwork this month, hoping to begin the new decade as a fully-fledged campus group.

QSAA will be the second group on campus pledging to assist LGBTQ students. The first group being the LGBT Alliance, which has existed on campus since late 2014. 

“The LGBTA has a more social focus. We’re interested in creating policy and social change on campus,” said Kyle Reese, President of QSAA. “LGBTA creates a safe, supportive space for LGBT students on campus, but QSAA aims at making the whole campus a safe, supportive place for all students.”

The QSAA is currently without a room or a budget, both being necessities for any group on campus to flourish. “I’d love to be starting now. There’s no reason why we couldn’t start making a difference now, but we really want the school’s backing. Without being ratified, it’s difficult to move forward,” said Reese.

The maximum budget afforded to Brooklyn College campus groups is $2,500 per semester, an amount that both Reese and Nick Cevoli, Vice President of QSAA, are unperturbed by.

“We’re thinking more of what things are important right now in terms of what changes need to be made, and not so much about what budget we need,” said Cevoli.

Reese added that the group is focusing on the action that is required to provide queer students on campus with things they need. Proposed action includes addressing the restroom crisis on campus; the fact that there is only one all-gender restroom on campus. 

The group also hopes to replace the adhesive signage on every restroom that states that students may use whichever restroom they identify with. Currently, the signage is peeling off, and, in some cases, has been ripped off completely. The QSAA wishes to install permanent signage campus-wide.

Additionally, QSAA aims to include a statement in each course syllabus regarding student pronouns, names and campus resources for LGBT students in the hopes of providing LGBT students with a supportive class experience, especially on that dreaded first day.

Reese said Brooklyn College is a great platform for the group, as they intend to build onwards from the campus. After attending November’s town hall meeting at the CUNY Graduate Center, Reese confirmed that Brooklyn College’s LGBT community was a sample set of a much larger community with issues that seem to span over all citywide CUNY colleges.

Both Reese and Cevoli expressed interest in aligning with other CUNY college LGBT groups to ensure that city-wide legislature becomes CUNY-wide legislature. “Every single-stall bathroom on campus in any city building needs to be all gender. That’s Local Law No. 79,” said Reese, painfully aware that very few single-stall bathrooms CUNY-wide adhere to Law No. 79.

QSAA awaits its approval, but in the meantime, the group hopes to educate, they hope to provide support, and they hope to take action.

 “Change is hard, but that’s why we do it,” said Reese.