In a move aimed at protecting transgender and other members of the Tufts community, senior and Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senator Matthew Pohl spearheaded an initiative to update the school's nondiscrimination policy.
In a unanimous 27-0-0 decision on Sunday, the TCU Senate passed Pohl's resolution, which "urges the University to add 'gender identity and expression' to the nondiscrimination policy," he said.
Tufts Transgender, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Collective Community Representative Mario Cervantes, was delighted by Sunday's results. "I'm so glad we got to address this issue. It's pretty important for the Tufts community to discuss equality on campus," Cervantes said.
The most impressive aspect of the resolution was the total support of the Senate, Pohl said. "This vote is extraordinary ... because issues like this can be contentious for many people."
The resolution holds that "transgender students, faculty and staff at Tufts should not experience bias during application, employment, promotion and/or termination."
The text also redefines the syntactical meaning of "gender" to be more inclusive to those who identify themselves as other than "male" or "female." The resolution reads, "the policy assumes that one can be identified as male or female when many students, faculty and staff, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and heterosexual people may not conform to conventional gender norms."
The resolution also notes that "federal courts have ruled that 'gender' as included in nondiscrimination policies does not protect gender identity and expression," and that Tufts should institute these changes if it truly "is committed to the fundamental principle of equal opportunity and equal treatment."
But Tufts' administration has the final word on whether the Senate's non-binding decision will ultimately be included in the University's nondiscrimination policy. Pohl has indicated his intention to "make sure the resolution is used in the process to finally get gender identity and expression into the policy."
Tufts' adoption of the resolution's language would not be a pioneering move in the world of higher education. "We would not be the first school [to adopt the policy], and I certainly hope that we're not the last," Pohl said.
Other schools throughout the country, including Middlebury College in Vermont, Ohio State University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have already implemented "gender identity and expression" into their nondiscrimination policies and have met with success.
"Many of Tufts' peer institutions, both public and private, on principle, have ... included protections for gender identity and expression in their respective nondiscrimination policies," according to the resolution.
Pohl considers this to be "a huge victory for the Tufts community," and noted that "people really need to know about this."
Pohl wrote the resolution when "a number of different people really started discussing this since freshman year." While Pohl is the resolution's author, he got help from a number of people on campus, including Director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Center Dona Yarbrough.
"I truly hope that this resolution will be used as a tool to create dialogue on campus," Pohl said. "What is so wonderful is how the Tufts students - through their representatives - have spoken on this issue."<$>
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