Exploring the History of LGBTQ+ Centers on Campus

In 1971, the University of Michigan (U-M) established the first campus-based LGBTQ+ center. After facing increased pressure from newly recognized student groups, the Gay Liberation Front and the Radical Lesbians, as well as the student body as a whole, U-M relented and opened the center.

At the time, the emergence of the queer and trans movement across the nation inspired many students to advocate for LGBTQ+ centers at U-M and campuses around the country. Often led by trans women of color, the movement included flashpoints like the Compton Cafeteria episode (1966), the Stonewall uprising (1969), and the creation of the Detroit Gay Liberation Front (1970).

Community activists often supported or even led campus protests, including occupying a residence hall at New York University (NYU) in 1970. The founders of Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries — Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera — who were also involved in the Stonewall uprising the year prior, headed the NYU sit-in.

While schools were initially slow to open on-campus LGBTQ+ spaces, the 1990s and 2000s saw a surge of new centers across the country. According to a 2020 study in Socius, an American Sociological Association academic journal, LGBTQ+ student groups are now at 62% of U.S. colleges and universities. However, far fewer schools employ at least one paid professional staff member or graduate assistant to direct an official on-campus LGBTQ+ center.

LGBTQ+ centers serve various functions depending on the institution type, students’ needs, staff size, and access to resources.

Scott Burden, the director of the Pride Center for Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity at Lehigh University, states, It is difficult to identify the primary purpose of an LGBTQ+ college resource center given the multi-faceted work that many centers do across college campuses. Overall, I believe the main purpose should be to ensure the overall success of LGBTQIA+ communities on campus and work to transform the institution so queer communities are able to thrive within all functions of the college or university.

Often, LGBTQ+ centers support and build community among LGBTQ+ students (and sometimes staff and faculty), advocate for changes in institutional policies and practices, assess the campus climate, and provide social and educational programs.

College students typically interact with an LGBTQ+ center for support, resources, and programming. These spaces can help students navigate their academic institution, provide appropriate referrals, and validate their full and authentic selves.

Identity development can be an important part of the college experience, and LGBTQ+ center staff and volunteers often have the skills needed to accompany and support students as they discover themselves.

LGBTQ+ centers also offer resources. Many maintain small libraries full of books, documentaries, and media centering LGBTQ+ stories. Students looking to get involved on campus, connect with student organizations, and engage in activism can contact LGBTQ+ centers to find opportunities, connections, mentorship, and guidance.

Some LGBTQ+ centers provide access to computers, scholarships for LGBTQ+ students, clothing exchanges, and travel funds to attend LGBTQ+ conferences. Their websites are also great places to look for resources.These spaces often provide useful information about navigating campus life, including how to change your name and gender marker on your ID and where to find all-gender restrooms on campus.

One of the most visible functions of LGBTQ+ centers is offering social and educational programming, such as Safezones, keynote speakers, performances, and film screenings. These are sometimes held on various LGBTQ+ awareness days, such as Intersex Awareness Day, Trans Awareness Week, and LGBT History Month.

While the growing number of LGBTQ+ centers on college campuses marks a positive shift, historically excluded groups still face challenges, including within these spaces. LGBTQ+ students of color, trans students, and LGBTQ+ students managing disabilities often report feeling excluded and unvalued at LGBTQ+ centers.

Due to a lack of attention to systems of oppression other than heterosexism (such as racism, anti-Blackness, cissexism, and ableism), these spaces often center the experiences and needs of white, cisgender, nondisabled, gay students.

LGBTQ+ centers are also not immune to biphobia or gender gaps in participation and sexism. These biases impact who benefits the most from these centers’ resources and programming. For example, a 2014 study in the Journal of Diversity in Higher Education showed that trans programming offered by LGBTQ+ centers tends to be about trans students rather than for them. Given the diversity of LGBTQ+ communities, LGBTQ+ centers must operate with an intersectional lens.

LGBTQ+ centers must also grapple with how to support college students facing food and housing insecurity. After surveying 43,000 students at 66 four-year and community colleges, a 2018 report by the Wisconsin HOPE Lab showed that lesbian, gay, and bisexual students experienced higher rates of food and housing insecurity and homelessness than heterosexual students.

The same was true for nonbinary students as compared with “male” and “female” students.^[1] Also, according to the survey, bisexual students were at the highest risk for basic needs insecurity. LGBTQ+ centers often lack the resources, skills, or capacity to support students’ basic needs.

Recent research examining LGBTQ+ center staff experiences shows that many of these spaces are understaffed, under-resourced, and need additional institutional support. Many students seek out LGBTQ+ center staff to support their collegiate needs, further stretching staff capacity.

Despite these challenges, the 2018 National Study of LGBTQ Student Success highlighted LGBTQ+ centers’ significance in students’ sense of belonging, safety, and inclusion, as well as in their identity and leadership development. These centers are also rich resources for students to learn about LGBTQ+ history and culture.

Activism played an essential role in forming LGBTQ+ centers, and these spaces continue to be sites of empowerment, support, and mentorship for students seeking to advance social justice on campus and beyond.

Additionally, LGBTQ+ centers often offer graduate and undergraduate students assistantships, internships, and work-study positions, providing financial assistance and professional development in an affirming environment.

The opportunities and challenges facing LGBTQ+ centers and staff highlight the need to establish and better support these crucial spaces on more college campuses. Students are increasingly and unabashedly living their truths and seeking to get involved in social justice activism. The need for affirming spaces for students to develop their identities, leadership skills, and voices continues to grow.

Burden recommends that colleges and universities take the following measures to better support LGBTQ+ students:

Best practices must ensure that we are centering those who are pushed furthest to the margins in our advocacy, says Burden. [It is important to work] across departments and divisions to develop a vision for a college resource center that encompasses many different layers and works to build a campus community where queer people are able to thrive as their most authentic self.