Shortly after he began a research internship with the U.S. Army last summer, Andrew Sabelhaus encountered an unexpected demand: Within the confines of the military center, he would not represent his LGBT community.
When the senior mechanical engineering major submitted a short biography for the Topographic Engineering Center newsletter, his supervisor omitted a line describing Sabelhaus’ experience as president of oSTEM – a campus group for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer students majoring in science, technology, engineering or mathematics.
“He told me stuff to the effect of, ‘It’s not appropriate to bring your private life in here,'” Sabelhaus said. “The metaphor he used was, ‘Your organization is like an organization for people who like to eat bugs. It’s not something you’d necessarily like to talk about.'”
Sabelhaus’s supervisor, Eric Zimmerman, denied he made that comparison and said he had no problem with Sabelhaus being president of oSTEM. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers spokeswoman Deborah Quimby confirmed in an email that Zimmerman omitted the line referencing oSTEM.
Although there are about a dozen LGBT groups on the campus, some university officials and students said there is a need for more groups linked to specific academic departments to address concerns of workplace discrimination. Currently, there are only two such groups: oSTEM and the Smith LGBTA Pride Alliance for graduate business students. A third group, LGBT at Smith, will also seek approval from the business school next month to cater to undergraduates of all majors.
While the university’s LGBT Equity Center sponsors some workshops about being “out” in the workplace, students said focused groups would fill a gap by providing a sense of community and professional opportunities.
Jimmy Pappadeas, a senior information systems and operations management major, said he is helping launch LGBT at Smith to give students professional resources they cannot find in other LGBT groups.
“I never really felt connected with the Pride Alliance or the interest groups. If you’re not catering to everyone, you’re driving away a lot of people who might otherwise be interested,” Pappadeas said. “For something like this, there’s a lot of support.”
Mykell Hatcher-McLarin, a sophomore sociology major and transgendered male, belongs to six different LGBT groups and co-founded mentoring program Peer Pride. However, Hatcher-McLarin said these groups do not focus on addressing professional concerns and he has not yet crossed the hurdle of applying to a “regular” job since a manager at Giant Foods “criminalized” his relationship with a girl about three years ago.
“On the job, I was treated differently,” Hatcher-McLarin said. “My girlfriend was talking to me and [my manager] said, ‘You need to tell your little friend that she needs to leave.’ I’m just like, ‘My little friend?’ and she’s like, ‘Yeah, your girlfriend, she needs to leave.'”
Hatcher-McLarin said he worries his gender expression eliminates chances to work with families and children in health care – he would not even reapply for a secretarial job he held when he first identified as lesbian. Many states have legalized marriages between gay and lesbian couples, but no existing Maryland laws protect transgender people from workplace, housing or health care discrimination.
“Possibly taking testosterone could alter my features and I can’t go back to that job because I would be perceived as a threat to the children,” Hatcher-McLarin said. “Are they looking at my dress or hearing my voice and saying, ‘Well this person is definitely queer, I don’t want them in my work place.'”
Alla Corey, the Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship program manager, said that is not the case in many instances.
“I look as a student as a person, as a whole,” she said. “What their skills are, what they do, how I can help them, so I haven’t really thought through how that aspect plays in here.”
Some students in science and engineering, however, said their fields are less inclusive, which Zimmerman said may be reflected in recruitment.
“We are reminded periodically of our need to increase representation of women engineers and black engineers because they ware underrepresented in engineering, but there is not an emphasis on hiring gays or lesbians or bisexuals in the workplace,” Zimmerman said.
Heidi Sauber, the engineering school’s co-op and career services director, said one or two students each year report an incident of harassment outside the classroom, but she cannot remember any LGBT-related grievances.
“It’s possible they think they should be able to handle it themselves or they don’t want to do what’s perceived as causing problems or shaking things up,” Sauber said. “Maybe they’re worried about repercussions.”
lurye@umdbk.com
