#ivyleague – DGALA | Dartmouth LGBTQIA+ Alum Association

Friendfactor, Dartmouth Run Non-Profit for LGBTQ Allies, Launches Fundraising Competition

Joanne Sprague ’04 and Chris Pearson Smith T’13 lead the non-profit Friendfactor to activate LGBT allies in business schools and workplaces across the country. Last week they launched a fundraising competition for alumni and Dartmouth is in the lead! Learn more about the program and become a supporter today: crowdrise.com/friendfactor

THE STORY

DEADLINE TO GIVE: DEC 31, 2014
FUNDRAISER SET UP DEADLINE: DEC 31, 2014

Help us make business schools a great place to be for all students!

Friendfactor’s 3rd annual MBA Ally Challenge is in full swing, with 23 top US business schools competing to engage as many students as possible as allies to make their MBA programs great environments for their LGBT classmates.

To support the sustainability of the MBA Ally Challenge in 2015 and beyond, we’re inviting students, alumni, and friends to get in on the fun. Between now and Dec 31, 2014, you can contribute to Friendfactor on behalf of the school you love (or another group you feel close to), and have the chance to win prizes and props in addition to supporting your school’s commitment to equality. Details are below. Thank you for your commitment to activating allies for LGBT equality and creating spaces where every person can be proud of who they are!

HOW TO CONTRIBUTE

There are two ways you can get involved:

Donate on behalf of the school you love by clicking “Donate to a fundraiser” above and choosing your school from the Team dropdown list. You can also choose the “Unaffiliated” team.
Set up your own group fundraising page by clicking “Set up your fundraiser”, and see if you and your friends or colleagues can beat out the best MBA programs in the country.

You can also invite your fellow alums and friends to join you in contributing to support your school or group. Just send them the direct URL link to your fundraising group page and that group will get credit for the donations you bring in!

PRIZES

To thank you and your friends for helping support the sustainability of this program, we’re giving out a number of perks for individual and group contributors:

GROUP AWARDS

Most Funds Raised: Free 10-person table at the Friendfactor Ally Challenge Awards Dinner in October, and honored on stage with an award for your group’s support. Click here for the rules.
Most Donors Contributing: A profile of your school or group’s work to engage allies for LGBT equality on the Friendfactor blog, and honored on stage at the Ally Challenge Awards Dinner for your group’s support. Click here for the rules.
Any school that hits its group goal of $6,000: Designation on the Friendfactor website as a “Pay It Forward” School whose alumni and supporter community has shown its commitment to building a culture of equality. Click here for the rules.

INDIVIDUAL AWARDS

$1,000 or More Contributed: Membership in the Friendfactor Founders Circle, which includes your name, photo and story on the Friendfactor website, two 50% discounted tickets to the Awards Dinner, and regular insider updates on how the competitions are going. Click here for the rules.
$500 or More: One 50% discounted ticket to the Awards Dinner, and a free Friendfactor t-shirt.Click here for the rules.
$250 or More: A free Friendfactor t-shirt. Click here for the rules.
$100 or More: Your name on the Friendfactor wall of supporters. Click here for the rules.

IvyQ Conference Considers Sexual and Gender Diversity

IvyQ Conference Considers Sexual and Gender Diversity – via Dartmouth Now
Posted on November 20, 2014 by Kelly Sundberg Seaman

IvyQ 2014 brought several hundred LGBTQIA+ students from the eight Ivy League schools and beyond to campus Nov. 6-9.“The IvyQ Conference brought together a critical mass of LGBTQIA+ students from Dartmouth and peer institutions for the explicit purpose of critically engaging with LGBTQIA+ knowledge and praxis,” says Reese Kelly, director of the Center for Gender and Student Engagement (CGSE), which provided an administrative home for the conference. Kelly is also interim director of the Office of Pluralism and Leadership. (LGBTQIA+ stands for lesbian, gay/genderqueer, bisexual, transgender, questioning/queer, intersex, and ally/asexual.)

Reese Kelly, director of the Center for Gender and Student Engagement and interim director of the Office of Pluralism and Leadership, gives the opening address at IvyQ 2014, held at Dartmouth Nov. 6-9. (Photo by Eli Burakian ’00)

The annual conference, which has previously been held at the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia, Brown, Yale, and Princeton, offers a mix of workshops, forums, speeches, and events with educational, social, and networking goals. It was planned and organized by a team of Dartmouth students, who handled everything from funding to logistics to hospitality. Attendees included students from the University of Oxford, RPI, Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Middlebury, Stanford, and Duke in addition to the Ivies.

“Student leaders, professional educators, performers, and advocates offered lectures, workshops, and discussions that empowered and challenged conference attendees,” says Kelly. “Due to generous support from the college and corporate sponsors, the Dartmouth IvyQ schedule boasted prominent voices on the national scene including Denice Frohman, Kim Katrin and Tiq Milan, Mara Kiesling, and the Rev. Dr. Jamie Washington.”

“As the CGSE, we are honored to have had the opportunity to support this endeavor, to engage student leaders in the process of conference organizing and community development, and to encourage critical reflection around topics of gender and sexuality,” says Kelly.

Michelle Hector, CGSE associate director, says, “Towards the end of the conference I overheard two Dartmouth students discussing how different the campus felt. They said something that students constantly reiterated throughout the conference: having so many LGBTQIA+ students on campus felt good. That made me so happy and proud of our students.”

IvyQ student chair Kelsey Weimer ’16 has received positive feedback about the conference from attendees and from “both institutional and student LGBTQIA leaders.” Dartmouth’s campus “really opened up and welcomed attendees,” she says, including 121 Dartmouth students who hosted guests. And, she says, “ideologically, the conference is progressing well, and is built to be up to speed with important social movements within the queer community.”

“We spent over six months planning this conference, and while there were struggles along the way, the planning committee went above and beyond to make the conference a success. We had amazing keynotes, informative workshops, and fun social events,” says team member Yeja Dunn ’16.

The Rev. Nancy Vogele ’85, director of Religious and Spiritual Life at the Tucker Foundation, was one of several Dartmouth community members on the conference program. Hosting the IvyQ conference this year was important for three reasons, she says.

“First, it allowed our LGBTQIA students to create and be a part of a larger LGBTQIA community. Dartmouth students loved meeting their peers from other institutions,” Vogele says. Also, she says, “a great deal of intellectual learning, debate, and networking happened. One student from Princeton took part in my workshop to get ideas for his senior thesis. Over 30 students attended a workshop given by Ethan Falleur ’16 on “What the Bible Says about Homosexuality” in order to learn in more detail from where and why opposition continues.” And finally, says Vogele, “hosting the IvyQ allowed the entire campus to think about issues of sexuality, justice, inclusion, and acceptance.”

“I think Dartmouth can benefit in a lot of ways from IvyQ,” says the conference’s finance chair. “It expands the minds of Dartmouth students to see the diversity of people out there and to learn to be less scared of them. It also helps Dartmouth as an institution by showing the visiting students and, by extension, the rest of the collegiate community that Dartmouth simply is not the scary, wild place that so many make it out to be. By ensuring this conference was funded, I hope we’ve made a difference in the lives of the attendees. IvyQ is a really unique opportunity for people to find lots of others with similar experiences and see the resources available to them.”

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Original Article Posted via Dartmouth Now:

http://now.dartmouth.edu/2014/11/ivyq-conference-considers-sexual-and-gender-diversity/

DGALA Board of Directors Elections

DGALA, the Dartmouth Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender Alumni/ae Association, is currently seeking nominations and applications for new members for our Board of Directors. This is an exciting opportunity to stay connected to life at Dartmouth and to be deeply involved in all of DGALA’s activities, including:

– Planning and vision-setting for the organization
– Providing leadership for and participating in one or more Board projects or initiatives
– Working with the College administration on policies that affect LGBTQA alumni/ae and students
– Organizing educational, social, and professional events around the country
– Mentoring young alumni/ae and current students
– Managing DGALA’s communications with its members and others, including via web properties, social media, and email
– Sponsoring important on-campus events such as annual Pride programming, all-class reunions, and mini-reunions

The DGALA Board of Directors is extremely active and members are required to commit to a minimum level of engagement during the entirety of their terms. Minimum engagement levels are defined as:

– Participating in at least 75% of Board conference calls (usually held once a month on Saturdays)
– Playing an active leadership/co-leadership role in at least one DGALA project or initiative
– Making a financial contribution at a level that is comfortable for your budget

Prospective Board members should be aware that DGALA is a not-for-profit corporation separate and apart from the College, and that the Director role includes fiduciary responsibilities to the corporation.

Applications, nominations and questions should be emailed to DGALA at DartGala@gmail.com. To apply, please submit a resume and brief cover letter outlining your interest in serving on the DGALA Board on or before December 8, 2014. In outlining your interest in serving on the DGALA Board, please discuss the following:

– Specific DGALA initiatives that are of interest to you, and why
– Other Dartmouth alumni leadership, Non-Profit or Board experience
– How you plan to align your commitment to DGALA as a director with your schedule
– Anything special about your candidacy that we should consider

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DGALA Mission:

The Dartmouth Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Alumni/ae Association (DGALA) strives to foster community between and among the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Allied (GLBTQA) alumni/ae of the College by furthering the intellectual, social, cultural and educational well-being of GLBTQA alumni/ae and students and providing the College and the greater College community with active support in matters of mutual concern.

DGALA also aims to enhance the experience of GLBTQA persons at Dartmouth and support the College’s commitment to diversity by fostering communications between and among GLBTQA alumni/ae and students, faculty, staff, administrators, the other affiliated groups and the College community as a whole.

To learn more about DGALA, visit dgala.com

Experiencing a More Inclusive Dartmouth

Dartmouth Now article, published November 17, 2014, “Experiencing a More Inclusive Dartmouth” by Caroline Kerr ’05

S. Caroline Kerr ’05 serves as president of DGALA, the Dartmouth Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Alumni/ae Association.

I savor those rare moments that are pinnacles of community. Moments when you have time to pause, reflect, and celebrate a community’s history, present, and future. Dartmouth’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and allied community is marking historic milestones this fall and enjoying many of these moments.

Over the weekend of Oct. 31 through Nov. 2, DGALA, Dartmouth’s LGBTQIA alumni association, celebrated its 30th anniversary with an all-class reunion that brought more than 200 alumni, students, faculty, staff, spouses, partners, and friends together in Hanover. The weekend events included the celebration of Triangle House, a new Living and Learning Community that supports LGBTQIA students.

The DGALA anniversary provided many moments when Dartmouth’s past and future came together. For some alumni, this was the first return to campus in decades, as their own time in Hanover was painful. One alumnus shared with me that he came to Dartmouth as a legacy, hoping to love the College as much as his father and his classmates had. Dartmouth wasn’t a welcoming place for him, and he described feeling cheated out of that storied Dartmouth experience. But this alumnus, along with others who suffered here as students, keeps coming back. Their resilience is remarkable, and they enjoyed a weekend of events and a community that embraced them. Some encountered a Dartmouth that they could proudly reclaim.

Alumni were welcomed back to campus by the rainbow lights shining on Blunt Alumni Center, with a DGALA banner and rainbow pride flag flying from the front. The weekend began with a reception hosted by President Phil Hanlon ’77 at Rauner Special Collections Library. The special collections team pulled articles, programs, and other items out of the archives that spanned gay history at Dartmouth between 1900 and 2014. Jim Noonan ’01 and Jimmy McNicholas ’01 took the stage in Collis and performed their fabulous Dartmouth Halloween show, Go Big Queen!, to a packed audience of students, alumni, and staff.

On Saturday morning we started early with a hike up to the fire tower on Gile Mountain in Norwich. Associate Professor of Government Sonu Bedi gave a lively talk on the future of civil marriage. Mid-day, the group convened at Triangle House, a place where LGBTQIA and allied students can spend time talking about topics related to their community, intellectual life, and social justice.

The first residents of the house moved in this fall, and the opening ceremony celebrated the long road to making Triangle House a reality, including the role alumni have played, from advocating for its existence, to serving on planning committees, to raising more than $500,000 to date to support construction and almost $90,000 for programming—a figure that exceeded the initial $500,000 goal for construction only. The ceremony and sheer existence of the house constitute a historic moment for Dartmouth, and a most moving one for alumni.

The day continued with a talk by Eric Fanning ’90, a member of DGALA and undersecretary of the U.S. Air Force. The event was the result of a collaboration between DGALA and the Dartmouth Uniform Service Alumni group (DUSA). We then enjoyed a special tour of the Hood Museum exhibit “Witness: Art and Civil Rights in the Sixties,” and wrapped up the evening with an awards gala at which several alumni were honored. Pete Williams ’76 received the Hero Award for his exceptional dedication and decades of service as DGALA’s secretary and treasurer. Lee Merkle-Raymond ’86 received the Leadership Award as one of DGALA’s early leaders and the first female president. Amanda Rosenblum ’07 and Laura Erickson-Schroth Med ’09 received the Vanguard Award for their groundbreaking work Trans Bodies, Trans Selves.

Sunday morning began with a celebratory service at the Top of the Hop, led by the Rev. Nancy Vogele ’85, DGALA member and director of Religious and Spiritual Life at the College. The Rockapellas performed Born This Way, Ella’s Song, and Same Love, with lyrics by rapper Angel Haze.

A member of the group spoke about how important it was to her to have alumni back on campus. Our presence, she said, helps make the College a place where she can be her full self. Andrew Nalani ’16 spoke as a straight man from Uganda whose own views have evolved over time. He gave a beautiful blessing, and we closed the weekend with a brunch and community forum discussing what’s next for DGALA.

At moments like these, I see Dartmouth at its best: innovative and inclusive. I look forward to many more in the future.

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Original Article: http://now.dartmouth.edu/2014/11/vox-populi-experiencing-a-more-inclusive-dartmouth

Got Something to Say? Members of the Dartmouth community are invited to submit essays for possible publication on Dartmouth Now. Email essays to:dartmouth.now@dartmouth.edu.

2014 All Class Reunion Photos and Recap

We would like to thank so many of you for attending our 2014 All Class Reunion in Hanover! Please take our brief post-reunion survey (regardless of whether you attended) to let us know about your experience: Survey Link

All Class Reunion Photos: If you have Reunion photos that you would like to share, please either post on Facebook or send them to dgala2014reunion@gmail.com so that we can host them on our page. Existing photos from the weekend can also be found on the DGALA Flickr and DGALA Facebook pages.

Board of Directors Elections: We will be holding Board of Directors elections in December of 2014. If you are interested in running for the Board and would like to see a full job description, please contact us at dartgala@gmail.com. Information about the current Board of Directors can be found at: dgala.com/about/board

Triangle House Giving: Additionally, there is also still time to contribute to Triangle House Dartmouth’s new LGBTQIA Living and Learning Community. Give online before the November 30th contribution deadline! (leadership level of $2,500+ for inclusion on the plaque)

Mentorship Program: We are also looking for alumni willing to mentor students over the course of a year (and beyond) through our mentorship program. The time commitment would be a couple hours per month for phone and/or videoconference contact with your “mentee.” If you are interested in becoming a DGALA mentor, please contact Director Rigel Cable ’10 (rigel.cable@gmail.com). Please note, mentorship is not restricted to career and networking but also life coaching, academic, interest-based etc. Please contact DGALA or Rigel with any questions.