ECC trains staff to make campus an LGBT 'Safe Zone'

Elgin Community College is attempting to create a safer environment for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students by training its faculty and administrators on how to help create a more inclusive campus.

About 130 ECC employees, including faculty and administrators, have been trained through a program known as the Safe Zone Project, used on college campuses nationwide to expose faculty, administration and staff members as well as students to LGBT culture and the barriers those students face.

It emphasizes embracing LGBT diversity, awareness and acceptance, said Vincent Cascio, ECC wellness professional.

"We talk about stereotypes, gender dysphoria, heterosexual privilege, as well as challenges within the LGBTQ community regarding societal acceptance and (the) individual process of coming out," he said, also referring to students identifying themselves as queer, a self-affirming umbrella term.

"It's a two-hour training, not very rigorous. We don't expect them to be experts," he said. "The purpose is to really provide a sense of awareness. Part of our goal as a college is to really address diversity and make our campus feel very much inclusive."

Cascio said the issues of gay civil rights and transgender access to bathrooms and locker rooms in public schools have not specifically risen at ECC, but the school wants to be proactive.

ECC does not know how many LGBT students are in the college's population but aims to provide more specific programming in the future.

"We have a lot of members who worry about how to come out to the professors, especially the transgender population," said Flo Perez, wellness peer educator and president of ECC's gay-straight alliance student organization, SWANS, or Students Who Are Not Silent.

Cascio said LGBT students are looking for mentors with whom they can talk openly and freely. The Safe Zone training takes employees through the best ways to react and interact with LGBT students, he said.

Safe Zone-trained employees place a logo outside their office doors and are listed on the college's website. Incoming students are informed of the Safe Zone program.

"That helps students recognize who is willing to be a strong advocate on their end," Cascio said.

"On campus, it's been a very positive thing," he said. "Our students are feeling more welcomed or at ease just being their authentic selves. It's fostering such a positive, healthy communication between students and the people that work here."