Allyship is "At the Heart of My Faith"
Ally Week at EHS, bookended by talks from a teacher and a student, featured several opportunities for student involvement.
The 2017 Ally Week at EHS was presented by the School’s Office of Equity and Inclusion and the student-run GSA club. The week, which was recognized from September 25-29, was bookended by chapel talks on Monday and Friday and filled with education, stickers, and support.
Ally Week is presented by GLSEN, a national organization that is focused on affirming students who identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning, and ensuring safe academic environments.
“Being an ally means showing God’s love to other people. Ask them how you can do that,” said Assistant Chaplain Rev. Timothy Seamans during his chapel talk on Monday.
During graduate school, “I was a person who studied faith, while my roommates were people who practiced faith,” he said. One roommate was rejected by his particular faith community for coming out as gay. It was the supportive friendship with this roommate that inspired Timothy to become a Christian and eventually a priest in the Episcopal Church, he said.
March Library displayed a curation of books featuring LGBTQ+ characters, and the Office of Equity and Inclusion provided resources for faculty and staff about how to support LGBTQ+ students and their allies. They held a brown bag lunch for the adults within the Episcopal community, with the purpose of helping them feel more prepared to help students.
Stickers were worn on shirts, laptops, water bottles, and other surfaces throughout campus by persons in the EHS community who wanted to publicly proclaim their allyship.
The week closed with Mark Berry '19 speaking in chapel about his own experience with allies. He gave a call, similar to Rev. Seamans’, for those who are allies of LGBTQ+ students to ask those people specifically how they would like to be supported.
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Ally Week is presented by GLSEN, a national organization that is focused on affirming students who identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning, and ensuring safe academic environments.
“Being an ally means showing God’s love to other people. Ask them how you can do that,” said Assistant Chaplain Rev. Timothy Seamans during his chapel talk on Monday.
During graduate school, “I was a person who studied faith, while my roommates were people who practiced faith,” he said. One roommate was rejected by his particular faith community for coming out as gay. It was the supportive friendship with this roommate that inspired Timothy to become a Christian and eventually a priest in the Episcopal Church, he said.
March Library displayed a curation of books featuring LGBTQ+ characters, and the Office of Equity and Inclusion provided resources for faculty and staff about how to support LGBTQ+ students and their allies. They held a brown bag lunch for the adults within the Episcopal community, with the purpose of helping them feel more prepared to help students.
Stickers were worn on shirts, laptops, water bottles, and other surfaces throughout campus by persons in the EHS community who wanted to publicly proclaim their allyship.
The week closed with Mark Berry '19 speaking in chapel about his own experience with allies. He gave a call, similar to Rev. Seamans’, for those who are allies of LGBTQ+ students to ask those people specifically how they would like to be supported.
“[Episcopal] has the possibility to become a place where everyone is accepting of everyone,” Mark said.
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