“He’s had to move around in the dark a little bit and see exactly what it is he has to do,” Posada said. “He’s been very good at making sure to email us and let us know that the Office can help.”
Posada also credited Bailey for fostering community dialogue after history professor Niall Ferguson made controversial comments suggesting a connection between economist John Maynard Keynes’s sexuality and his economic theory. As Ferguson’s remarks garnered international attention, Bailey was quick to respond within the Harvard community, looping in various student organizations to an email discussion about the controversy and helping to organize a lunch conversation with Ferguson at the Harvard College Women’s Center.
Bailey has also sought to build community within the Office itself, which is nestled in the basement of Boylston Hall between colorful yellow walls. Along with office hours, Bailey has led the Office’s first ever class of student interns and hosted a weekly community hour that regularly draws between 15 and 30 students who meet in the Office to eat and play games.
PUSHING FOR POLICY CHANGE
Bailey’s efforts have earned praise from fellow administrators and students, who say he has made significant strides in his first months at Harvard.
“What I’ve seen and heard is students’ appreciation for his commitment and his advocacy,” Dean of Freshmen Thomas A. Dingman ’67 said.
However, students in the BGLTQ undergraduate community say that the Office’s recent successes are not enough. For them, more must be done at a policymaking level for some BGLTQ resources to improve.
“I’m reservedly optimistic in the sense that [the Office] establishing itself more definitely adds to visibility and opens the door to discussions that take place, but those discussions need to manifest in policy change,” said Riley, the transgender student. “I want to see obvious results that make a difference on campus.”
One such meaningful change, these students say, would be the introduction of gender neutral housing options for freshmen, a policy that was established in the upperclassman Houses in 2010. Other students complained that many of the resources at Harvard do not focus on bisexual or transgender students as much as they should, instead primarily targeting gay and lesbian community members.
While students acknowledge that Bailey’s progress this past year represents a step in the right direction, they are eager to see further changes.
“The Office of BGLTQ Student Life is very new, and I think it needs a year or two to fully grow and develop, but these issues are important,” wrote Sam, a rising senior in Lowell House, who requested that his name be changed because he did not want his sexuality to be publicly known.
For his part, Bailey said he believes the time is ripe for the BGLTQ community to expand its visibility on campus.
“I’m excited to keep growing, really,” Bailey concluded. “That’s what it’s about at this point, to keep growing.”
—Staff writer D. Simone Kovacs can be reached at dkovacs@college.harvard.edu. Follow her on Twitter @simkovacs.