Iowa State University is hosting the 2012 Midwest Bisexual, Lesbian, Gay Transgender Ally College Conference Feb. 10-12. One student from Texas Women’s University, 17 from Southern Methodist University’s LGBT group Spectrum and an SMU professor are attending, according to the Daily Campus. Spectrum Co-President Harvey Luna put the group together after attending last year’s conference, according to the SMU newspaper.
Karen Click at SMU Women’s Center for Gender and Pride Initiatives called it a national conference for student leaders. She said this is the second year SMU has participated.
“They come back inspired to create change on campus,” she said.
Registration for the event is $80 per person and the group chartered a bus from Dallas.
“The SMU Student Senate paid for them to go,” Click said.
The MBLGTACC conference began in 1991 and takes place annually in the upper Midwest. The goal is to learn new strategies to face problems LGBT students face on campus daily.
Two weeks ago, Youth First Texas hosted a conference of North Texas gay-straight alliances.
Hi DT, Just to clarify since more and more of these groups are starting to become active (yea!)… The summit held at Youth First Texas a week or so back was for high school GSA organizations and was mounted with considerable organizational input from the Texas GSA Network, which focuses on groups for middle and high schools. I brought a student from Fort Worth and was impressed at how much everyone assembled worked to accomplish in that one day. Hats-off especially to GianCarlo Massi for his drive and inspiration to empower others. While the SMU and TWU contingent is attending the conference you write about in Iowa, local university and college groups who hope to be a part of something closer to home have an opportunity right around the corner. TCU is hosting a southwest regional gathering of GSA organizations on March 2-3. Registration before 2/17 is $40 and after that $50. https://tcugsa.tumblr.com/ TCU hald a summit last year for DFW area university GSA’s that was a solid start from which they’re building. It’s nice to see such a broad new wave of organizational acitivity across so many campuses. Literally thousands of people benefit from the camaraderie alone. My sincere thanks and admiration for those who’ve endeavored for decades to achieve so much and to those who are now taking up the baton to pay it forward.