Over the past few months, members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and questioning community have started lobbying the University to hire a full-time director to help facilitate programming and support for the GLBTQ population on campus.The proposal, written in 2003 by several professors, has been adopted by TransBrandeis, a division of Triskelion. Marcus Simon '07, Alice Ittelson, 08, Samantha Andler '09, Lily Schwartz '08 and Lisa Borten '07 are leading negotiations on the proposal. The group is currently circulating the proposal among faculty and students to garner support for it.

Simon, a coordinator of TransBrandeis, explained that the University depends too much on the students to take care of all the issues associated with the GLBTQ community. "There's just a lot of things that are sort of impossible to tackle as students because they happen everywhere and we really don't have that much time on top of these students trying to . do extra curriculars and have personal lives."

Simon said the GLBTQ community is working on ensuring that all the institutions on campus are following the non discrimination policy that TransBrandeis proposed last fall that includes protection of individuals on the basis of "gender identity and expression." Other TransBrandeis initiatives include getting "gender-blind" housing for students and changing the forms students have to fill out to offer other options under "sex," besides "male" and "female."

Brandeis is the 53rd U.S. university to adopt a gender identity and gender expression non discrimination policy.

Ittelson, a member of Triskelion, said that the staff person would work on these issues as well as serve as an advisor to Triskelion and a liaison between the GLBTQ community and all other campus organizations-academic, athletic and others. As a professional, this staffer would have more clout with the administration than the students currently do, Ittelson said.

The staffer would also offer help in responding to "incidents of discrimination, homophobia, transphobia, any kind of violence," Ittelson said.

The staffer would also hold office hours, encourage the Department of Residence Life to bring counselors from the Queer Resource Center-a branch of Triskelon-to hold discussions in all first-year residence halls, make Triskelion, the QRC and TransBrandeis more well-known among the administration, publish a monthly newsletter and create a Web site.

Ittelson stressed that nothing regarding the position has been finalized yet, but the Student Union supports the initiative, and TransBrandeis hopes to see the position filled soon.

Assistant Dean of Student Life Jamele Adams said support exists for the job; it's just a question of finding the money to fund it. "There's a big hug . of support for this position," he said.

According to the proposal, the staff person would most likely report to Adams.

Ittelson said many universities have staffers in place who handle some of the responsibilities that are left up to students here, such as peer counseling.

Simon said that student leaders in the QRC hold a weeklong training session for peer counselors, but that it's often times too much work for the student leaders.