Welcome!
This website is dedicated to providing LGBTQ allies with information on how to navigate relationships with transgender people and support them, as well as resources for trans people themselves. We are focused specifically on college campuses, however much of this information is applicable to various situations and locations. Please use the page tabs above to navigate.
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Meet the creators
DALLAS DOUGLASS
I’m 20 years old, a queer transgender man, and my pronouns are he/him/his. Some of my hobbies include dog training, photography, film and TV, visual arts, and cooking. I came out as pansexual in 7th grade and as transgender in sophomore year of high school. My social and physical transition has been easy in comparison to experiences of other trans people, but was by no means a walk in the park. At NIU, I am a member of Speaker’s Bureau, the campus panel dedicated to LGBTQ education. I am a transgender rights activist and educator in my spare time, so this project was a natural extension of my work towards acceptance.
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GRACE RODRIGUEZ
I am a heterosexual cisgender woman whose pronouns are she and her. I am majoring in special education and am minoring in deafness. I attended York Community High School in Elmhurst, Illinois. It was a very large public school and there was a prominent LGBTQ presence as a result. I’m interested in this topic because many of my friends in high school were in the LGBTQ community and I have family in the community. I have a cousin who identifies as a trans woman and I witness her being misgendered constantly. I want to have the ability to help and be an ally for those who are in the community. Through this project, I want to help inform cisgender people on how to become strong allies to the trans community.
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VERONICA WOODS
My pronouns are she and her. I am a bisexual cisgender woman. I attended Schaumburg Christian School since I was five years old. I am a freshman at Northern Illinois University. I am a Kinesiology major. I am interested in this topic because it is really important to accept everyone and make everyone feel comfortable. I came out when I was seventeen years old. It was really hard for me, so I understand how difficult it is to come out and feel comfortable in your own skin. Through this project, I want to inform and help people respond in an appropriate way.
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our project
In the Spring 2019 semester, the three of us were paired together with a common goal: we wanted to explore the hardships that transgender college students and faculty face on college campuses and provide solutions. While there is much existing literature to indicate solutions for problems faced by the greater LGBTQ community, there is significantly less information regarding trans people, and even less when the focus is narrowed to college campuses. In order to fill that gap, we conducted original research through surveys on the transgender community and their allies on college campuses. We found that transgender students believed that their peers and some faculty lacked education in a rather significant way, but the allies we surveyed were more than willing to learn about the transgender community and the issues they endure. It is in the best interest of all college campuses to make all students feel safe, especially transgender students. The simplest way to achieve this is to educate students, faculty, and administration on the transgender community. Hence, this website was born.
Sponsored and maintained by the Northern Illinois University Gender and Sexuality Resource Center