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The Harvard College Office of BGLTQ Student Life — commonly known as the “QuOffice” — will celebrate its 12-year anniversary with a birthday party Friday afternoon.
As the QuOffice turns 12, staff and undergraduate student leaders who work with the office spoke to The Crimson to reflect on its role overseeing LGBTQ+ programming at the College.
In an interview, Meagan S. von Rohr, who directs the QuOffice, said her goal is to make the space one of inclusion rather than differentiation.
“We just try and be a space where being queer is actually the least remarkable thing about you at Harvard. It’s normalized, and it’s welcoming for all folks of all walks of life,” she said.
Several students said the QuOffice, located in the basement of Thayer Hall, provides a relaxing, non-judgmental, and welcoming space for LGBTQ+ undergraduates.
Desmond O. Herzfelder ’24, a volunteer at Contact, a peer counseling group for queer or questioning students, said he was grateful that the QuOffice made students feel “implicitly celebrated for themselves just by walking into the room.”
“I had met almost no queer adults really in my life, hadn’t seen many pride flags that felt like they were in a space directed towards me,” Herzfelder said.
Neha Kalra ’26, a co-vice president of the Harvard Undergraduate Queer Advocates, also testified to the inclusive community formed by the QuOffice.
“Harvard can seem kind of big and scary when you're new and coming in from the outside,” Kalra said. “It's hard to sometimes feel like you have a place there.”
“I think that it's so cool, how [the office] brings people together. It was one of the things that made me really want to go to this school,” she continued.
Beyond just the physical space, the QuOffice offers resources such as connecting students with gender-inclusive housing, providing grants for sexuality- and gender identity-related events, and hosts the Queer Students Association and Contact.
Hannah L. Niederriter ’26, a HUQAD co-vice president, said the QuOffice serves an essential role in helping along the work of queer advocacy groups on campus, especially when it comes to planning events such as Trans Week of Visibility and the gender-inclusive restroom campaign.
“There’s been a lot of progress that we wouldn’t necessarily have the time and energy to be able to commit to if we weren’t also Quinterns, which is really great,” Niederriter said.
von Rohr credits her predecessors at the QuOffice for building it up to what it is today and making its mission of inclusion possible in the first place.
“There’s a huge list of people who made my job possible,” von Rohr said, adding that the 12-year history of the QuOffice “gives our community a sense of continuity — that we have always been here, and that you’re not alone in your queerness however you come to Harvard and with whatever other intersecting identities you have.”
As for the future of the QuOffice, von Rohr is certain about how they will approach any next steps.
“I want to make sure that the QuOffice leads with love in everything we do moving forward,” she said.
—Staff writer Anna Feng can be reached at anna.feng@thecrimson.com.
—Staff writer Nicole L. Guo can be reached at nicole.guo@thecrimson.com.
