Hello,

I am Alex Clay (a student at St. Mary's College of Maryland) who is standing up with my peers for LGBTQ+ rights. We are currently, as I write this, in a sit-in in Calvert Hall (Administration Building) after an unsuccessful mediation with administration. We have made some compromises already- such as changing at least one bathroom in each academic building to be gender neutral and that the Transgender Name Change Policy could wait another year before being implemented. But these are our demands that we will not back down from. 

Here is a google link to speeches, photos, and explanations (including an explanation about Kelsey Bush and a letter from 2014 demanding the exact same things): https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1CuuXOoeFo4-8n4cneKLcLl1LsOc4O_SI?usp=sharing 

Here is our highlight video of the President Tuajuanda Jordan https://youtu.be/iQwPHqAYfys 

Here is the current list of demands:

• A formal apology sent to all students for the mistreatment of transgender rights since (at least) 2019. This is specifically in regards to the name change policy.
• The official resignation of Kelsey Bush, Interim Chief Diversity Officer.
• Bias investigation of IT Office + The Athletic & Recreation Center + The Wellness Center including those listed in the original document.
• Expand open housing to be accessible to any student who applies.
• Make open housing more visible and known especially to incoming first year students.
• Clearly dictate between open housing and open housing policy (such as changing open housing's name to gender inclusive housing or open housing policy to co-ed housing).
• Priority given to trans and LGBTQ+ issues on campus.

Official Update to The Demands:

We are currently awaiting the Steps of Accountability (in Google Folder above) to be approved in order for this sit in to officially be considered finished. This basically includes all the compromises we've made over all of the demands. Sam, Baz, and I have a meeting with President Jordan tomorrow (10/20) to discuss this.

For those wanting to still help, just know this is a waiting game. The best we can do now is reach out to people (such as reporters!) with information about us and share share share the petition. Thank you all so much, it's very appreciated.

And, if you ever want to reach out to me directly, my email is arclay@smcm .