Program Overview
The primary mission of Mason’s Safe Zone+ Program, like our LGBTQ+ Resources Center, is to create a safer, more welcoming & inclusive campus environment, to strengthen community and encourage networking among faculty, staff, and students toward the goal of supporting the well-being of LGBTQ people.
The Safe Zone+ Program is an evolving education and ally development program. Currently, it consists of four workshops that help participants on their own allyship development journeys. The first component is our new Intro to LGBTQ+ Communities session, which is up to 60 minutes long and offers participants an easy access point for getting involved with the LGBTQ+ Resources Center. Intro to LGBTQ+ Communities will also very much prepare participants for the following three individual 3-hour module sessions. Upon completion of an Intro to LGBTQ+ Communities session, faculty, staff, and/or other Mason professionally employed participants will fill out a form that will provide the information for their placard and let them opt in or out to being included on a Google Map that will be featured on our LGBTQ+ Resources Center website, showing where everyone who has engaged with our program is located. The idea behind giving the placard for completing this introductory component is that we can build a baseline for folks to be able to display the placard, and enhance overall visibility of LGBTQ+-affirming spaces. We also want to build this visibility in online spaces, thus the Google Map. Once folks have the placard, they can upgrade it with stickers upon completion of the Awareness, Gender, and Ally Skills Building modules.
Mason’s Safe Zone+ Program seeks to:
- Provide visible support and resources for LGBTQ+ students, faculty, and staff.
- Provide a way for allies – supportive students, faculty, and staff – to visibly indicate that they are safe contacts for LGBTQ+ people at Mason.
- Promote increased awareness and understanding about sexual orientation and gender identity across the Mason campus.
- Promote an open-minded, safe, and welcoming campus environment in which students of all sexual orientations and gender identities can live and learn fully.
Sign up for a workshop here: https://lgbtq.gmu.edu/safe-zone/register/
Learning Outcomes
Folks who participate in each of these modules will be able to:
Intro to LGBTQ+ Communities (recommended to take FIRST)
- Navigate contemporary ways to engage with inclusive language
- Distinguish between gender and sexuality
- Identify examples of allyship
Awareness Module (recommended to take SECOND)
- Consider their own experiences of intersecting identities
- Engage with LGBTQ+ socio-historical culture
- Describe LGBTQ+ identities
Gender Module (recommended to take THIRD)
- Articulate the complexity of gender
- Identify the salience of gender in their own lives
- Describe how intersections of social identities affect the lived experiences of trans, non-binary, and gender expansive folks
Ally Skills Building Module (recommended to take FOURTH)
- Revisit breadth and depth of complex identities and experiences of LGBTQ+ people and communities
- Discuss ways to become a more active ally
- Apply active allyship behaviors to real-world scenarios