Covering Kansas University over the past year, I’ve seen a number of students and employees (I’d say an increasing number) automatically volunteer their preferred gender pronouns when introducing themselves — usually before giving presentations, asking questions in forums, speaking at Student Senate meetings, etc.

If you’re not familiar with gender pronouns, for me, such an introduction would sound like: “Hi, I’m Sara Shepherd — she/her/hers — the Journal-World’s KU and higher education reporter.” Others might say “he/him/his” for individuals identifying as men, or “they/them/their” for people who identify as neither men nor women.

Some KU staffers also include those pronouns in their email signatures or their contact information on the KU website, among them Jen Brockman, director of the Sexual Assault Prevention and Education Center, and a few of the folks over at SILC, the KU Student Involvement and Leadership Center.

Incoming students visiting campus this summer will now see a lot of pronouns engraved on name tags, as well.

KU’s Office of Multicultural Affairs and a couple other KU units just started adding preferred gender pronouns to their staffers’ name tags. Students who are Office of First Year Experience Orientation Assistants or Undergraduate Advising Center Peer Advisors also will have pronouns on their name tags, I believe, though I’m still waiting to hear back from people in those offices to verify.

Office of Multicultural Affairs director Precious Porras said the goal is to be proactive and inclusive. (I asked, and she did say that if any staffers don’t feel comfortable including their preferred pronouns on their name tags, they’re not required to.)

“It’s a way to say, ‘This is me sharing who I am, please feel free to share who you are,'” Porras said. “Regardless of how you identify around your gender, this is a space where we are inclusive of all identities. In particular for folks who identify outside of the binary, this is a way to show we are inclusive and we don’t make assumptions about their gender identity.”

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• I’m the Journal-World’s KU and higher ed reporter. See all the newspaper’s KU coverage at KUToday.com. Reach me by email at sshepherd@ljworld.com, by phone at 832-7187, on Twitter @saramarieshep or via Facebook at Facebook.com/SaraShepherdNews.