The Women’s College Experience: Part II

Last semester, I wrote about gender identity on Scripps campus from the administrative perspective. With the “We accept women, we graduate students” admissions policy, and supportive Dean of Students Bekki Lee, Scripps seems to have a good foundation. But it is time to turn to the students to see how well policy matches with reality.

But not all students at Scripps identify as women, and for these students, these things are not a given. “We accept women, we graduate students,” Dean Bekki Lee told me last semester for part one of this series. But does Scripps respect, support and encourage all students during their time at Scripps, particularly in regard to gender identity and expression?

While all students on Scripps campus are part of the gender diversity on campus, the disparity between how women are treated and how students who don’t identify as women are treated is made most apparent by asking them. I spoke with two students, Ben Storlie (’13) and Evan Friedenberg (’12), about their experiences as Scripps men.

In general, Scripps has been a space where good, supportive friendships and friend-groups can be and have been built. For Ben, Scripps’ Family CLORG and the queer community at Scripps was very welcoming and felt like a family. He met “friends who were going through the same personal journey.” With this community, Ben said, “I could experiment with gender expression—skirts are fun!—and my own presentation, and everyone was super supportive.”

He also participated in the Women on Women (WoW) queer women discussion group every week (even though many participants did not identify as women) and GendeRevolution while these groups were running. “Having these spaces where discussion about gender happened a lot was nice: to have all this talk instead of not talking about it,” Ben recollected.

Evan has also found that the queer community, particularly the Queer Resource Center (QRC) for the 5Cs and the student community at Scripps, was a safe and supportive community. “Administration had nothing to do with it. It was all students,” he said. It was the students who created an environment in which “people think about gender and gender empowerment. In a same-sex institution, suddenly people think about it. I had never heard that gender and sex were two different things until that was said to me by an older Scripps student who I respected a lot, and it clicked. That’s the point of a Scripps education: to be in a safe, inclusive environment that creates thinking that will change the world to be what I want it to be. It’s getting me prepared to change the world.”

Despite these welcoming communities, being a guy at Scripps means having to pick one’s battles. “For the most part, everyone’s intentions are good,” Evan explained, “but what separates people is how ignorant or not ignorant they are on [transgender] issues.” Both Ben and Evan have had varying experiences with fellow students on campus and on the 5Cs with professors and students. Some have been positive, while others have been frustrating and exhausting. For the most part, relations with peers “work out functionally,” Ben said. Those who are aware of the transgender community on campus and are part of the queer community see gender identity as a non-issue, and something that should and is affirmed and respected. Outside of this community, there’s a higher complexity of reactions from people not understanding what it means to be transgender or to have a preferred gender pronoun (PGP), or to how to respect and affirm one’s gender identity. If people misgender Ben, they either correct themselves or ignore when others correct them. Some professors made a conscious effort to call him by his correct gender pronouns and to get the rest of the class to follow suit, particularly during the early months when he first changed his PGP.

Evan stated that when he is in addressed in large groups, such as mass emails from RAs or administration, emails begin with “Hi, Ladies” rather than gender-neutral language. “It doesn’t register that it should be gender-neutral language. They I’m in the group that they are addressing, and they know that I am not a lady,” he explained.” It’s obnoxious and alienating,” and a simple shift to gender-neutral language would be more inclusive without erasing either the women or the men of Scripps College.

Erasing the gender diversity on campus and affirming gender diversity is as easy as getting one word right. Training for leadership roles such as Peer Mentors, Motley baristas, RAs, and in administration is supposed to start with name and preferred gender pronoun introductions, as well as context about the diversity of student life on campus: not everyone identifies as a woman, as white, upper class, and so on. This training is supposed to make a point that everyone is listening, and that everyone should be aware and inclusive. Evan offered that this discussion should continue in the classrooms, too, as professors do introductions on the first day of class. “It would help a lot because it offers a space for people to ask questions and understand more early on. It also sets a standard for the class to follow from the beginning,” he said.

The reality is that while this training is supposed to be implemented, it hasn’t always been used, and sometimes the training has backfired. According to Evan, the Motley barista training this past semester did not include PGPs in the introductions, which led to months of his being misgendered by co-workers. When the issue was finally addressed, it drew more attention to him than necessary instead of being a subtle way of acknowledging all forms of diversity within the Motley and Scripps community.

When these standards of respect, understanding, and discussion of diversity aren’t met, there are serious consequences: Evan recently quit the CMS Softball team due to discrimination; changing Evan’s birth-name in the computer system took a year; Ben has learned to take the good with the bad, and has focused on other aspects of his life, such as his major; spaces on campus that are specifically for people in the LGBTQ community become alienating and unsafe when transgender students are not included or acknowledged in the conversations.

This year in particular has been harder for both Evan and Ben. They had similar comments on the overall attitude about gender diversity at Scripps this year: “Since Joss [Greene, who was interviewed by [in]Visible in 2009 on his transition whilst at Scripps] graduated [last year], things felt like they’ve gone backwards,” Evan observed. “It was like Scripps said, ‘We understand what transgender is,’ and then Joss graduated and everything started over.” Joss is also Ben’s friend, and during his time at Scripps, Joss was extremely supportive. “Joss’ coming out was a catalyst of people realizing it’s okay [to be transgender],” Ben said. “I’m sure there were transgender guys here before Joss, but he set the way for many people to feel safe [on campus with their gender identity and expression].” Since Joss graduated, it’s been harder for Evan to find safe communities on campus.

We need to make the safe community bigger, and to continue the discussion that Joss sparked, and that Evan and Ben embody. Finding and creating spaces that discuss diversity, including gender diversity, comes down to the students who are Scripps’ driving force. The policies and discussions have been implemented, but we, the students, are responsible for maintaining and respecting Scripps as the diverse, rich college community that it is.