Then & Now

I remember my freshmen year at Michigan State University back in the fall of 2002. I was away from home for the first time ever and it was an exciting and sometimes lonely experience. Exciting, because MSU is in East Lansing and the town is very much so geared towards college students. Lonely, because I am an only child and I found myself very quickly missing the comforts of home. I went from being in a high school graduating class of ninety four students to living on a college campus with hundreds, if not thousands, of fellow students.

Attending MSU was my first introduction to interacting with other ethnic groups besides African Americans or Caucasians. Suddenly, I was immersed with people having Spanish, Korean, and Chinese backgrounds on one campus. What consumed most of my curiosity that first year at State was four letters: LGBT. I had no idea what each letter stood for and why that abbreviation seemed to be such an invaluable organization to the student body at Michigan State. All I knew was that the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered influence on campus promoted equality and support through a lot of literature and signage.

Just imagine my amazement when I discovered that the American Library Association has established The Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgendered Round Table. It should come as no surprise that their mission is to serving the information needs of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered professional library community, and the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered information access needs of individuals at large.

Even more impressive are some of the responsibilities the GLBTRT promotes:

· work toward eliminating job discrimination against gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered employees of libraries, archives, and information centers;

· advocate revising classification schemes, subject heading lists, indices, etc., in order to remove terms derogatory to the lives, activities, and contributions to culture and society of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people;

· work with groups outside the Association interested in achieving equal rights for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people;

Final Thoughts: Although I do not identify with any of the words that make up the GLBTRT, it’s great to know that I live in a country that attempts to ensure the rights of everyone. The ALA does such an excellent job at representing and protecting the rights of all Americans as it relates to libraries and library resources.

All of the above information about the ALA’s GLBTRT can be found at:

http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/rts/glbtrt/index.cfm