BUILDING EQUALITY | When Philomena Aceto, right, realized that Eastfield College had no LGBT organization on campus, she and another student decided to start one themselves. Judith Dumont, left, signed on as the fledgling group’s faculty advisor.

Snow delays start of Eastfield College GSA, but organizers say first meeting will be rescheduled

DAVID TAFFET  |  Staff Writer
taffet@dallasvoice.com
MESQUITE — Eastfield College was the largest of the area’s community colleges without a Gay Straight Alliance, according to student Philomena Aceto. But now Aceto is working to change that.
Aceto — whose partner is longtime activist Dawn Meifert and who has her own history as an activist — began working on her degree at Eastfield last summer. She met Kris Fleskes, another student, and they realized there was no representation for the LGBT community on the more than 18,000-student campus.
Other area two-year colleges have GSAs and campus LGBT alliances. Last fall, P.R.I.S.M., which stands for Promoting Respect In Sexual Minorities, opened successfully at Navarro Community College in Corsicana. The GSA at Richland College, the largest Dallas County Community College, meets twice a month.
“Let’s start one,” Aceto urged Fleskes.
Any campus group must have a faculty advisor but faculty cannot start a group themselves. So Fleskes and Aceto met with two Eastfield staff members, Judith Dumont and Kristie Vowels.
Dumont, former director of Youth First Texas, is now the faculty advisor for the new group.
When she began working at Eastfield last summer, Dumont said, she tried to make her office the safe space on campus for the LGBT community and indicated that by putting an HRC sticker and “proud ally” stickers on her door.
She said she cheered when the two students approached her about starting the GSA.
Aceto said Vowels told her, “You are exactly what we’ve been praying for.”
The group’s first meeting has been postponed twice because of weather. Aceto said that’s just giving her more time to promote the club in classes and on campus.
“I’m out preaching it every day,” Aceto said. “This isn’t about being gay. It’s about equality.”
To emphasize that point, they’re calling their group Equality.
Aceto said she’s has been running up against some resistance and a lot of indifference in an area she called one of the most conservative in Dallas County.
“We’re curious how the campus will receive us,” Dumont said.
She attended advisor training and said there was no reaction when she announced the name of the group she would facilitate.
“I’m hoping everything will be OK,” she said.
But Dumont agreed that the campus was very conservative.
“There were raised eyebrows on campus when I didn’t change my name after I got married in November,” she said.
Aceto said she would like to bring some interesting speakers to campus and produce some creative programming.
“We want to go after bullying,” she said.
Dumont said the group was important as a safe space not just for students, but for faculty, staff and administrators as well.
She said she’s already planning to participate in National Day of Silence. Last year, Dumont organized that event among students who are active with Youth First Texas.
Eastfield College was closed on Wednesday, Feb. 9, the most recent launch date for Equality. Aceto said the group would reschedule over the next week.
This article appeared in the Dallas Voice print edition Feb. 11, 2011.