Wednesday I was busy trying to put together a (belated) National Coming Out Day panel for next week (nobody who can avoid it sets foot on campus on a Friday), emailing with the director of admissions about a diversity recruitment email that’s going out to prospective students in my name as the president of OUTLaw, while also working on setting up a meeting with the VP for Student Development where I went for undergrad.
It was entirely coincidental that I happened to be working on all of those things at the same time, but it was kind of an interesting concurrence. Whether it’s the panel, the diversity recruitment effort, or the ongoing conversation with my alma mater, it’s all really about creating a campus climate that feels safe for LGBTQ students so that nobody feels the need to hide.
Campus climate isn’t a Christian college issue, or a state school issue, or private school or public school issue. Some schools do things better than others, but I doubt there’s any school out there that has a perfect climate where every LGBTQ student feels totally safe and supported all of the time. And so, on this National Coming Out Day, let’s work toward creating campuses where the climate is such that even the most timid of kids can feel safe to come out and be out.