Queers and Allies

November 13th was the last meeting of the Fall 2009 quarter so don’t come next thursday or you are gonna be like “WTF?”.

Congrats to our new officers Jen as Media and Public Relations (as Alex has stepped down) and Emily as ICC Liaison.

Previous officer, Joe has been been appointed Co-Pres/VP as Jenner is no taking on the position (giggle), so Jenner is now our of Alumni Chair and Coalition Liaison.

We sent around an email list. If you’d like to be added please send your email too our email or on facebook.

Those of you who have gotten HIV testing during the Gender Bender dance, there are 10 people who still haven’t recieved their results, please go pic them up so we can have hopefully have them return in the following years.

Jen brought to the meeting a new project she is working on called Cafe Change and is looking for people to help her out. I probably can’t explain this project as well as Jen could so please get in contact with her! Basically, Cafe Change  a blog/social site that allows young GLBTTQQIAAP (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, transsexual, questioning, intersex, aesexual, ally, and pansexual) to converse and share their stories, their defeats, victories, and everything in between.  The goal of the site will be to invoke hope and inspiration!…in the words of Jen. Again, for further information you can ask any of the officers or more specifically, Jen!

We are starting a phone tree for people to stay in contact during the winter if anyone needs that extra shoulder to lean on. If you need help finding somone in your area or just anyone to talk to, get in contact with the officers.

And we are still taking suggestions for next quarter. I’ll open up an extra blog post for you guys to leave suggestions.

More events:

Sunday, Nov.22:
Savannah Gay & Lesbian Film Society presents Rivers Wash Over me
@ 6pm Telfair Jepson Center for the Arts

GLBTQ Coalition will hold a meeting. More info on that later.

Saturday, Dec. 5:
Gay Volunteer Day 
@ 10am-11:30am Savannah Humane Society 7215 Sallie Mood Dr.

~JL <3

There are a few charity/volunteer events and activites that are coming up this month, the first being the Moveable Feast with the Young Activists club. The event will be next Saturday Nov. 14 but we will most likely be meeting the day before, Friday Nov 13 at Boundary to prep for the event. Bring yourself and others to make nummy sandwhiches.

Tomorrow, Nov. 7, Georia Southern University is having GLBTQ & Allies Conference from 8:30am-4:00pm for $10.

More events later! Keep an eye out for them!

Also, last meeting we discussed an event that took place over a week ago infront of the Trustees theater. The article from savannahnow.com:

Police bully citizens, curtail free speech

Savannah police threatened 20 gay leafletters with handcuffs, arrest, and a ride in a paddy wagon for passing out fliers on a public sidewalk in front of the Trustees Theater (owned by the Savannah College of Art & Design), in downtown Savannah.

Savannah’s well-dressed and powerful were attending the “Innovation Awards,” patting themselves on the back for being a progressive city. Outside, a swarm of police scattered the leafletters, claiming the sidewalks on both sides of the street were private for the evening, and that they would be arrested for just walking on the sidewalk.

The city has since confirmed that the event permit did not make the public sidewalks “private,” giving only the right to keep cars off a one block stretch of Broughton Street. We appreciate having received apologies from The Creative Coast and the City of Savannah, and we appreciate the meeting Alderman Van Johnson has arranged with the interim police chief.

We have yet to hear from the person who used his “great power” to summon a large number of police to commit a crime, i.e. throwing U.S. citizens off public sidewalks because he didn’t agree with their opinions.

Moreover, why did prominent politicians, including Alderman Tony Thomas and County Commission Chairman Pete Liakakis, who were in attendance, stand by and watch as their police committed this embarrassment? If this is an example of how interim Police Chief Willie Lovett plans to run the department, we need to keep looking for a new chief.

The incident is a reminder that innovation exists in many American cities, but beautiful and romantic Savannah is not yet on the list.

KEVIN CLARK

Georgia Equality

Savannah

There was also a meeting this Friday morning requested by the First City network to talk about this issue but so far not much has been done to seriously addres the issue properly. Thank you to those who went and I hope you guys were able to take something away from the meeting even though it didn’t go quit as expected.  But besides that, Krista made amazing rainbow ribbons, get yours today!

Good luck with FINALS and have fun!

~JL

WOW!!

HUGE THANKS to everybody that came out and really made the Gender Bender one heck of a great event!  We topped charts with our attendance this year in ResLife and I got word from Krista that Jim Evola (the SCAD Cafe manager) was so extremely impressed by the way we handled the venue that he wants to have us back!  So all you cleanup crew folks… major kudos to you all.

Luke from My Brothaz Home (the guys doing the free HIV testing) were very pleased with the turnout.  They said the event from their point of view was an immense success.  They hope to work with us in the future and want to come in to one of our meetings one day.  Cool beans, in my opinion!

I’d love to see any photos or accounts of the GBB, please post away!  I know I had a great time with everybody, it was awesome to see folks coming out (tee hee, punzilla!) to have a good time… especially in drag!  Hopefully next year I won’t be so busy that I don’t have time to procure a costume. 

Until next time, have a GREAT week and thanks so much for making this event possible!  You guys rock!

As always, I continue to be amazed and impressed by your dedication to the club… decorations are TOTALLY BOSS this year!!  Fliers are stamped and out, we’ve contacted *almost* all of our vendors, we even have new folks coming in to lend a hand.  This years gender bender will kick SERIOUS POOTY-TANG.  NO LIE.

In other news, I got a call from a gentleman named Spencer who is interested in integrating all the local LGBTQ organizations into a giant cuddle puddle of resource sharing.  This is a GREAT opportunity, because it means we have a chance to use venues like CLUB ONE and the FIREHOUSE to hold events like the Gender Bender Ball!!!! YES!
I’ll continue to speak with him, but to let you all know the big inter-club meeting will be on November 22nd 2009.  If you can come out please do, but I know that’s after classes let out so most of you folks are probably high-tailing it home for the holidays and that’s totally cool.

ALSO, I got in contact with the FCN newsletter editor to see how we could help with that.  They’re looking for articles, art, poetry… anything related to our acronym that you think others would enjoy seeing.  This is your chance to be PUBLISHED!  Woohooo!!!

Drop us an e-mail at qaa@scad.edu if you have questions, or feel free to pounce on me at the next meeting.

WHICH REMINDS ME, don’t forget to bring all your supplies and old magazines so we can really spruce up SCAD Cafe for the dance.  It’ll be amazing, I know it already.

Sweet deal!  Keep on truckin’, good luck with homework!  *runs off to finish animating*

-Chris

I just have to say it… I am EXTREMELY impressed by you guys this year.  You have no idea how many warm fuzzies I get every time I hear that someone is doing something for the group and for each other!  That’s such a change from organizations that I’m used to and it really impresses the heck out of me.  I am very proud and honored that you are all making this commitment to this organization and I’m sure I speak on behalf of the entire board when I thank you with the deepest gratitude for your continued efforts to make us all dance with joy. 

In other non-chris-squee news, we got our budget proposal!!  For all you folks who weren’t at the last meeting, we fought hard and won a $600 portion of the ICC budget!! That is more than DOUBLE what we’ve ever gotten in the past, and that is AMAZING!  So thanks to everybody for coming out and showing your support to enable us to get this much-needed funding.  It’ll all be going directly back into the club to support our community service (and more), so if there’s anything you want to see us do with it please let me or any of the other board members know.

Speaking of which, WE NEED A BANNER! Yes, that’s right!  A giant, vinyl banner that will represent the club for years to come.  We have some existing designs, but lord knows we ARE in an art college and I bet there are some folks with pretty outstanding ideas out there.  So if you have a design you’d like to see representing SCAD Queers & Allies, submit it!  You can e-mail it to the club e-mail (qaa@scad.edu) or find one of the officers to check it out.

We’re also in the market for finding ‘things’ and ’stuff’ that we can brand our club with like buttons, hats, etc.  If you have any amazing ideas for that let us know too!

In conclusion:  You’re awesome, we got money, and now we need to spend it.

LOVE!
-Chris

It’s midterms once again and we hope you all are doing well! But dont let midterms cloud your head, there is still lots of work to be done for the Gender Bender ball that is next week!

Gender Bender
Where: Cafe SCAD Ballroom
When: Oct. 24th
Time: 8pm-midnight

The next meeting (Oct 22th) will be the last meeting before the ball so we need to get as much of the decor done then. And get your costumes ready! Song requests are also being taken on the facebook group!

During the meeting Jen showed us her ubertastic video of pictures and footage from the Equality March in Washington DC. Check it outttttt and check this one out too.

-JL

First of all!

Thank you Counseling & Student Support Services (CS3) for giving your presentation at Q & A! And thank you for those bee pens!

Contact Info:

York Hall
counseling@scad.edu
912.525.6971

Afterwards we discussed how the budget proposal is going to work and what our plans are for this year to make use of the money (check out the previous post for more detail of the budget). For shuttles we are aiming to get Q & A members to the Humane Society but also we are looking to hear of any ideas that you all are interested in. This club is about you guys and if there are some sort of other activism activities/etc. you’d like to mention, feel free to bring it up!

Finally, committees for Gender Bender. During this meeting we got together at the end to discuss whats going on in each committee and recieved the emails from those who were there to keep everyone updated. If you are on a committee list and still want to participate but couldn’t make it to the meeting tonight we could still use your email…or at least show up to a club meeting beforehand so we can talk to you about what needs to be done.

This weekend is the DC Equality March! Have fun everyone who is going!

<3 JL

OK, everybody!

The club Fall 2009 Budget Proposal was submitted today!  If anyone wants to see a copy of the document (or any of our other forms) e-mail us at “qaa@scad.edu” to request them.

We submitted a request for just under $700.  Last year we got $250, although I don’t know how much we requested to know if it’s a ligitimate consideration or not.  The actual allocation process will occur on the 9th and will be attended by our fabulous and amazing ICC rep Joe!!  (thanks!!)

As soon as we know something, you’ll know something.  Keep your eyes open and your expectations high! 

-Chris

This past meeting on Oct. 1 we had Queers and Allies’ first panel discussion with heart felt and funny stories. We hope that everyone is able to take something away from this and maybe we can do this again sometime! Thank you to those who shared their personal stories. *hugs*

After the panel we had a signup sheet for Gender Bender committees but we are still looking for more volunteers for some of the committees. Feel free to join more than one committee, they really aren’t time consuming. If you weren’t at the meeting and want to volunteer you can sign up at the next meeting, here, the FB group, or the QAA email. Here is what we need:

-Decoration/Materials Comittee
-Poster/Educational Promotion Comittee
-Advertising Committee
-Entertainment Committee
-Setup Committee

We probably have enough for Take-down committee but help is still appreciated. <3
Next week we are having a Counseling and Student Services (CS3) Presentation!

Also, if anyone is having a problem of not being able to join the facebook group you probably need to change your Network. To do so, go to Settings > Networks > Edit Info > And then enter SCAD and your grad date. You should then be able to return the group and see a “join” button. If that doesnt work, get in contact with an officer or someone who knows what they are doing.

Until next time!

~JL

OK, guys… I’ve been pulling some strings behind the scenes.  During the weekend I met up with Lynn Gensamer, the director at the Humane Society, to talk about coordinating some service opportunities with them.  Read: playing with puppies and kittens!

She said it sounded like a great idea, so I’ve sent some correspondance out to the right folks to get this to happen.  I’m also in contact with some local hospices and other organizations to get us in the door there.  If this all goes well we may have a bi-monthly shuttle to the Humane Society and 2-3 opportunities during the quarter to help out with other service projects.  All our logged hours can go directly onto your resume, and trust me… that looks VERY good to future employers.

I’ll keep everybody up to date with what’s going on.  As soon as I hear back from Nancy Richards (volunteer coordinator) I’ll put up the verdict.

Keep being awesome, guys!! Can’t WAIT for the next meeting!  It will be super fantastic, we have so many interested folks! 

-Chris