As the only LGBTQ club at LBCC comes to an end, LBCC should take advantage of this opportunity to create a permanent center for the LGBTQ community on both LAC and PCC, to better promote workshops like SafeZone which would help create a more inclusive campus.
Queer Space was the only student organized club that was dedicated to providing sanctuary for LGBTQ students, however, the club has not met all semester, has no current president and has lost its charter for a lack of representation at the LBCC club senate meetings.
Unfortunately that means that without Queer Space at LBCC, the LGBTQ community has no real place to go on campus for LGBTQ resources, guidance, or even just the simplicity of a safe place.
It is true that society has become more inclusive toward the LGBTQ community, in large part due to the people who had to overcome hardships not too long ago, but recent events have shown us that this country still has a ways to go.
For example, there is still resistance to pro-LGBTQ legislation on both the national and state levels, countless instances of discrimination against the trans community, and June 12 will mark only the third anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting, an attack that took the lives of 49 LGBTQ partygoers, and wounding 53 others.
Keeping those examples in mind, it becomes apparent that there is still a need for a LGBTQ space at LBCC, and in addition to that, the school should not depend on student organized clubs to fill that need.
LBCC should provide that space for LGBTQ students itself.
The school is already off to a good start, with the implementation of a new educational program called SafeZone, that helps promote a more inclusive campus through a series of workshops that teach concepts like, the difference between sexual orientations, gender identity, gender expression, and terminology.
SafeZone is a great program that can help the school continue being an inclusive campus, however the program would be even more effective if it was offered more often, like once a month.
Even then, workshops that take place once a month aren’t going to help a student that may need help on any of the other 29 days that month.
Now that Queer Space has ended, LBCC should dedicate funding to build facilities that are modeled after The LGBTQ Center in Long Beach, which would provide services such as resources to find LGBTQ events around Long Beach, a library with LGBTQ reading materials, and onsite certified counseling.
It would be a permanent fixture at LBCC that would be available as a place of guidance, knowledge and safety for any student in the LGBTQ community, and even better, it wouldn’t be limited to the short span of time a club like Queer Space would have to meet each week, or a sampling of inclusivity workshops that meet even less than that.
In order for LBCC to ensure inclusivity and safety for all its students, there has to be ensured inclusivity for its LGBTQ students, and the best thing that the school can do to achieve that would be to allocate funding for LGBTQ resource facilities on both campuses, and continue to provide workshops like SafeZone.