Vassar’s 2nd Annual “Early” Pride Celebration Allows Participation
National Pride Month was still two months away, but Vassar LGBTQ Center interns Joe Lippman ’26 and Jude Robinson ’26 were busy on the afternoon of March 31 handing out balloons and rainbow flags in the College Center as the College kicked off its own Pride Month observance. “It’s nice to see so many people helping us celebrate who we are,” Lippman said as he surveyed the festivities.
For the second year in a row, representatives of nearly two dozen student orgs and college departments took part in the festivities, which featured craft-making booths, popcorn and snow cones, and other displays and activities.
National Pride Month is officially observed in June, commemorating the June 1969 protests following a raid of the Stonewall Inn in New York City. But Vassar LGBTQ Center Director Danushi Fernando said she and her interns had organized the kickoff event and other activities so the College community could take part in the celebration while school was still in session.
Fernando said she had chosen March 31 as the day for the event because the date is observed as International Transgender Day of Visibility. “It’s important for everyone in the LGBTQ community to be appreciated,” she said. “It’s wonderful to see so many student and campus groups taking ownership of this celebration.”
Employees from the Center for Career Education celebrated the occasion by raffling off a Pride-shirt-clad stuffed Vassar “womp-womp.”
Christine Stuart, First-Year Experience Program Associate, took part in the event by helping those who attended create crafts in rainbow colors. “I think it’s great that people here on campus have created such an inclusionary environment,” Stuart said. “It’s important that we all show our solidarity.”
Amanda Cora, program manager of the Jay Vincent Johnson ALANA Cultural Center, agreed. “It’s great to see so many people from every part of the campus partnering for this event and supporting the [LGBTQ+] community,” Cora said.
Other recent Pride events included a Drag Bingo night on March 24, co-sponsored by the LGBTQ Center, Cushing House, and the VC Royals; and the Queer and Trans People of Color dinner on March 25, co-sponsored by the LGBTQ Center and the Maroon Society. Throughout the month of April, the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center is hosting an exhibition in the Focus Gallery titled Apocalypse Sky, a display of works by artists whose lives were transformed by the HIV/AIDS crisis during the 1980s and 1990s. The exhibition was co-curated by Hiram Perez, Associate Professor of English, and Elizabeth Nogrady, the former Deputy Director and the Emily Hargroves Fisher ’57 and Richard B. Fisher Curator, with assistance from the Women's Feminist and Queer Studies Department.
The LGBTQ Center’s capstone event, Lavender Graduation, will be held May 5 in Taylor Hall.
